Imaging Spectroscopy Processing Environment on the Cloud (ImgSPEC): A
Prototype of an Open Science, Scalable Processing Environment
Abstract
Imaging spectroscopy data is becoming more readily available from
different satellite and airborne platforms. As this data becomes more
prolific, there is a need for shared data tools and code for wrangling,
cleaning, and analyzing it. The geospatial Imaging Spectroscopy
Processing Environment on the Cloud (ImgSPEC) pioneers an on-demand
science data processing platform with scalable back-end compute. It
considers user experience and facilitates open science. ImgSPEC enables
users to create data products in areas of interest using default
workflows from registered algorithms, while also enabling users to
customize scripts and workflows. ImgSPEC seamlessly interfaces with NASA
Earthdata Search and tracks appropriate metadata for reproducibility
when generating data products to share with others. Users can work in
their preferred workspace (e.g., Rstudio, Jupyterlab, or command line)
thereby facilitating use of open science software packages and
collaborative coding through Git. ImgSPEC leverages existing NASA-funded
information technologies such as the hybrid on-premise/cloud science
data system (HySDS) and the Multi-mission Algorithm and Analysis
Platform (MAAP). It also creates seamless interfaces with NASA-funded
ECOSIS – a crowd-sourced spectral database, and ECOSML – a
crowd-sourced model database. We demonstrate ImgSPEC on the Terrestrial
Ecosystem use case processing through to foliar traits and fractional
cover, thus aligning with driving thrusts for the NASA Surface Biology
and Geology (SBG) Science and Applications Communities. As this
technology is more widely adopted the interface with Amazon Web Services
and NASA Earthdata search will enable broader use of more data (publicly
available or loaded by the user) across more domains.