Feb. 25, 2002

NEW NASA GLOBAL CHANGE MASTER DIRECTORY AVAILABLE

NASA's Global Change Master On-line Directory (GCMD) 2002 provides descriptions of Earth science data sets and services relevant to global change research. This directory will help students and scientists find a wealth of data from NASA's Earth science program and other organizations.

The Global Change Master Directory now holds more than 10,600 descriptions of Earth and environmental science data, with information on how to obtain the data and/or direct links to data sources. The individual data set descriptions were contributed by more than 1,300 data centers, government agencies, universities, research institutions and private researchers around the world.

Access to the directory is available through http://globalchange.nasa.gov or http://gcmd.nasa.gov. Selected portions of the directory can be placed on a CD for users without Internet connections. However, new data set descriptions are added daily, and others are updated on an ongoing basis.

"This directory has an appeal to a wide audience, ranging from students and teachers to researchers, Earth scientists, and anyone searching for Earth science data," said Lola Olsen, Directory Project Manager at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

The directory is organized by topics: Agriculture, Atmosphere, Biosphere, Human Dimensions, Hydrosphere, Land Surface, Oceans, Paleoclimate, Radiance/Imagery, Solid Earth, Snow and Ice and Sun-Earth Interactions. There are also listings for Earth science data-related services, Earth science conferences, an actively maintained list of Earth science web resources and an education area called the Learning Center.

Users can click on any topic to explore data sets of interest. For example, to search for data sets on Methane, users would go to the topic, Atmosphere; scan the list under Atmospheric Chemistry, and then click on Methane. All associated data sets then appear on the left side of the web browser in alphabetical order. Clicking on the data set of choice displays a summary of the data set, its content, its geographic coverage, when it was collected and the data center information. Direct links to the data are provided whenever available.

The directory content is shared and available as part of NASA's contribution to the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites' (CEOS) International Directory Network (IDN). The content is also available through the National Spatial Data Infrastructure's (NSDI) Federal Geographic Data Committee's (FDGC) Clearinghouse.

If you have any questions, contact: Lola Olsen, Project Manager, Code 902, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. 20771 Phone: 301-614-5361 E-mail: olsen@gcmd.nasa.gov

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Contact:

Lynn Chandler
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
(Phone: 301/286-2806)
lychand@pop100.gsfc.nasa.gov

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