Wide. Open. Science. What a fitting theme for AGU Fall Meeting 2023, the year of Open Science as declared by NASA, building upon UNESCO’s open science recommendations that emerged in 2021. This theme was exemplified with openness beyond science – extending to diverse perspectives, communities, ideas and applications.
The Informatics section sessions featured advancements in artificial intelligence, FAIR data, cloud-optimized data, analysis-ready data, and more. However, data curation and processing underpinned presentations in many other sessions as well. A recent article in Nature showed the rising proportion of session abstracts mentioning machine learning or artificial intelligence over the past years, and this year seemed to continue that trend.
The World Data System held a Town Hall mid-week to familiarize attendees with the WDS mission and action plan, and to provide an overview on specific efforts being taken to address priorities that emerged from the Members Forum in October. Further contributions during the week included:
- A lightning presentation in a session on AI data readiness organized by the Earth System Information Partners (ESIP) at the Open Science Pavilion in the exhibit hall (Reyna Jenkyns, WDS-ITO)
- A panel discussion on the topic of “The Importance of FAIR Principles for Future Scientific Research Collaborations, as part of the IUGS Deep-Time Digital Earth Town Hall (Reyna Jenkyns, WDS-ITO)
- Session presentation on Moving us towards TRUST: The next steps in outreach and adoption (Meredith Goins, WDS-IPO)
- Promotional materials and door prizes at the Ocean Networks Canada (hosting organization for the WDS-ITO) booth in the exhibit hall
Most importantly, this was an excellent venue to interact with many existing and prospective members of the World Data System. Kudos to the AGU organizers for another terrific event, and we look forward to convening again next year in Washington, DC!