Monthly Archives: April 2020

A Data Ecosystem to Defeat COVID-19

Bapon Fakhruddin is a specialist in climate and hydrological risk assessment with a focus on the design and implementation of hazard early warning systems and emergency communication. He is Technical Director, Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Resilience at Tonkin + Taylor, New Zealand. He is also Co-Chair for the Open Data for Global Disaster Risk Research task force with CODATA.

Bapon Fakhruddin discusses why the COVID-19 pandemic requires thinking and decision making supported by a data ecosystem which looks much further into the future than previous short-term approaches.

The novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has created a human crisis globally, which has demanded an array of drastic, immediate responses. The United Nations (UN) Secretary-General has swiftly called for action, “for the immediate health response required to suppress transmission of the virus to end the pandemic and to tackle the many social and economic dimensions of this crisis[1]“. The pandemic also requires thinking and decision making supported by a data ecosystem that is more complete than currently, and which looks much further into the future than previous short-term approaches.

The COVID-19 outbreak has led to the proliferation of initiatives to facilitate open access to scientific research and databases and encourage research collaboration through digital platforms. However, there are concerns about the quality of data and publications provided in near real-time, leading to potentially poor decision making. These issues include comparability and interpretation of data, notably between countries, insufficient specification of methodology, and political acceptance of invalid results potentially biasing scientific methods. A call for data and research is necessary in relation to the discussion of the transmission of the disease.

Read more: https://council.science/current/blog/setting-up-a-data-ecosystem-to-defeat-covid-19/

 

March 2020: Publications in the Data Science Journal


Title: Dataset after Seven Years Simulating Hybrid Energy Systems with Homer Legacy
Author: Alexandre Beluco, Frederico A. During F°, Lúcia M. R. Silva, Jones S. Silva, Lúis E. Teixeira, Gabriel Vasco, Fausto A. Canales, Elton G. Rossini, José de Souza, Giuliano C. Daronco, Alfonso Risso
URL: http://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2020-014

Title: GIS Project ROSA: FAIR Principles in the Petroleum Industry
Author: Anastasia Odintsova , Alena Rybkina, Julia Nikolova, Anna Korolkova
URL: http://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2020-013
Title: MASER: A Science Ready Toolbox for Low Frequency Radio Astronomy
Author: Baptiste Cecconi, Alan Loh, Pierre Le Sidaner, Renaud Savalle, Xavier Bonnin, Quynh Nhu Nguyen, Sonny Lion, Albert Shih, Stéphane Aicardi, Philippe Zarka, Corentin Louis, Andrée Coffre, Laurent Lamy, Laurent Denis, Jean-Mathias Grießmeier, Jeremy Faden, Chris Piker, Nicolas André, Vincent Génot, Stéphane Erard, Joseph N. Mafi, Todd A. King, Jim Sky, Markus Demleitner
URL: http://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2020-012

Title: Experimental Data of Muon Hodoscope URAGAN for Investigations of Geoffective Processes in the Heliosphere
Author: Anna Kovylyaeva , Ivan Astapov, Anna Dmitrieva, Vladimir Borog, Natalia Osetrova, Igor Yashin
URL: http://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2020-011

Title: Risk Assessment for Scientific Data
Author: Matthew S. Mayernik , Kelsey Breseman, Robert R. Downs, Ruth Duerr, Alexis Garretson, Chung-Yi (Sophie) Hou, Environmental Data Governance Initiative (EDGI) and Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP) Data Stewardship Committee
URL: http://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2020-010

Title: How Do People Make Relevance Judgment of Scientific Data?
Author: Jianping Liu , Jian Wang, Guomin Zhou, Mo Wang, Lei Shi
URL: http://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2020-009

Title: Who Bears the Burden of Long-Lived Molecular Biology Databases?
Author: Heidi J. Imker
URL: http://doi.org/10.5334/dsj-2020-008

 

Disaster Risk Reduction and Open Data Newsletter: April 2020 Edition

CODATA GO FAIR, RDA, and WDS outline their joint commitment to optimise the global research data ecosystem and identify the opportunities and needs that will trigger federated infrastructures to service the new reality of data-driven science.
A first concrete example of this is the following – ‘Data Together COVID-19 Appeal and Actions’. The COVID-19 pandemic presents a major test for our science system and for our research and data infrastructures.  These infrastructures, such as open science clouds and data commons, must serve the needs of science, policy, and humanity not only in ‘normal times’, but also in times of crisis by providing controlled access to quality data in real-time and at scale for a range of scientific- and policy-related responses – https://council.science/covid19/

Disaster expert shares COVID-19 lessons from China
A serious shortage of medical resources was one of the main challenges which China had to overcome to stabilize the COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, Hubei, where a mortality rate of 4.7% was recorded compared with 0.9% in the country’s 30 other provinces.

CODATA President, Barend Mons ‘World View’ Opinion Piece in Nature: ‘Invest 5% of research funds in ensuring data are reusable’
‘It is irresponsible to support research but not data stewardship’, says Barend Mons.

How South Korea is suppressing COVID-19
Trace, test and treat. That sums up the strategy pursued by the Republic of Korea since it detected its first case of COVID-19 on January 20 and its first death on February 20, without imposing a lockdown.

CODATA: Call for expression of interest for contribution to the Linked Open Data for Global Disaster Risk Research
The first policy brief is expected to be released in August 2020. The global pandemic is a powerful reminder of the necessity of the international community’s intensified and sustained commitment to emergency preparedness.  We are thus inviting experts in disaster risk reduction data and policy issues to collaborate on preparing these documents.

Information is power – Climate services reach 10.2 million people
UNDP-supported climate information and early warning systems projects have reached 10.2 million people in the past 12 years. Explore the power of information to supercharge progress toward the Sustainable Development Goals.

UNECE: Recommendations on the role of official statistics in measuring hazardous events and disasters
This publication clarifies the role of NSOs and other members of NSS in providing information related to hazardous events and disasters, and identifies practical steps that these organisations can take, in coordination with national agencies responsible for disaster risk management, to better support disaster risk management efforts.

UNESCO: World Water Development report 2020
The 2020 edition of the World Water Development Report (WWDR 2020) entitled ‘Water and Climate Change’ aims at helping the water community tackle the challenges of climate change and informing the climate change community about the opportunities that improved water management offers in terms of adaptation and mitigation.

Mami Mizutori: Reflection on the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction: Five Years Since Its Adoption
Five years ago member states of the United Nations (UN) adopted the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 (United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015) in Sendai, Japan, a city still recovering from the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami.

Climate risk and response: Physical hazards and socioeconomic impacts
In this report, the focus is on understanding the nature and extent of physical risk from a changing climate over the next one to three decades, exploring physical risk as it is the basis of both transition and liability risks.

Coronavirus (COVID-19) “Infodemic” and Emerging Issues through a Data Lens: The Case of China
Mainly based on Chinese newspapers, social media and other digital platform data, this paper analyzes the timeline of the key actions taken by the government and people over three months in five different phases.

Considerations about the Cascading Effects of COVID-19 on Critical Infrastructure Sectors
This paper is offered in an effort to better understand not just the way a pandemic affects various critical infrastructure sectors, but to illustrate the cascading and escalating effects across the United States in various ways.

NASA: Introductory Webinar: Satellite Remote Sensing for Agricultural Applications – 14 April, 20 April, 5 May
This training will address how to use remote sensing data for agriculture monitoring, specifically drought and crop monitoring. The webinar will also provide end-users the ability to evaluate which regions of the world agricultural productivity is above or below long-term trends. This informs decisions pertaining to market stability and humanitarian relief.

International Science Council Webinar: Transforming science communication for transformations to sustainability – 15 April
This webinar will look at why developments in science communication matter for transformations to sustainability, communicating about ongoing transdisciplinary research with new audiences in an inclusive and ethical way, and how today’s communications tools can be used to foreground voices that are frequently marginalised in climate change debates.

NASA: Introductory Webinar: Using the UN Biodiversity Lab to Support National Conservation and Sustainable Development Goals
This training, offered in partnership with the UN Development Programme (UNDP), will teach participants about global biodiversity-based uses of remote sensing

SDSN – Happiness & Sustainability Around the Earth – 24-hour webinar 22 April
Join experts from SDSN’s global network as they share how they are building a happier world.