Palmer Station LTER SiteFlash - August 2000 - Karen Baker

Field support by information management for the Palmer LTER field 
season (annual January cruise and seasonal October through March station
work) included initiation of field procedure notebook transformation to 
a streamlined electronic notebook. Year round weather data collection, 
biomass monitoring and field updates continued. Past season efforts 
were synthesized for publication in the Antarctic Journal.

Research group communications were augmented through electronic 
facilitation such as shared web pages and powerpoint archives. 
Two focused efforts included an ongoing Palmer LTER group data 
sharing & modeling effort and site review preparations (Aug 1999).
With respect to information management, the site review commented:
"The review team was favorably impressed with the progress made 
in the area of information management."

PALMER LTER shared data files remain available to investigators via the 
ICESS unix network while transition from desktop unix to pc workstation 
interface was completed.  Although the Antarctic sites were not eligible for 
annual LTER technology supplements, disk archive space was purchased to 
accommodate the growing data holdings.  Relational database software testing 
continued (i.e. miniSQL, mySQL, access, SQLserver) using the LTER Software and 
Site System Design surveys as test cases. The Site System survey, developed at 
last year's LTER IM meeting, was implemented online as a summary pertinent to 
the ongoing LTER KDI (Knowledge and Distributed Intelligence) Activities.

LTER NETWORK LEVEL activities included submission and acceptance
of a multi-authored BioScience manuscript describing the LTER IM 
paradigm of the 1990's. The LTER Information Manager Newsletter 
DataBits, re-designed and re-initiated in Spring 1999, was published 
in Fall 1999 in partnership with Denise Steigerwald, McMurdo Information 
Manager.  Meetings attended include the LTER DataTask meeting at Albuquerque 
(Feb00) as well as the NSF National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) 
Workshop at SDSC (Mar00). A multi-site authored poster "LTER IM: Paradigm 
Shift or Paradigm Stretch" was designed for the LTER All Scientist Meeting.

The LTER SITE DESCRIPTION DIRECTORY development continued with support 
from the LTER Network Office (Feb-Jul00) in additon to a one year NSF 
small grant. Ongoing communications with the Network Office addressed 
interface of the site with the personnel directory.  A three tiered prototype 
using SQLserver database software and perl for web interface was developed 
online with plans for port to the Network Office.

EDUCATION OUTREACH and information management partnership broadened
with publication of a Palmer LTER site brochure, our first site CD 
(LTER Sea-Ice Cruise Jun99), an education outreach trunk, and a 
proceedings (Palmer Long-Term Ecological Research Education Outreach 
Forum: Baker et al , SIO Report 99-14, 1999) with prototypes for Education 
Outreach Goals and Guidelines on Creating a Long-Term Perspective in 
Classroom Science. Palmer LTER sponsored a 'Teacher Experiencing Antarctica' 
(TEA) participant as part of last season's Antarctic field team and plans 
are underway to sponsor another TEA participant.  Karen Baker became a TEA
Advisory Board Member attending the annual TEA board Meeting (Sep99) as well 
as the second LTER Education workshop at Kellogg Biological Station in 
Michigan (Oct99). All Scientist Meeting (Aug00) contributions included 
an education poster and co-chair of the workshop "Learning from LTER 
Data in K-12 Classrooms".  The site review stated: "The K-12 and public 
outreach activities are excellent and should be continued and expanded".