The Federation of Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP) has elected Peter Fox, chair of the Tetherless World Constellation and a professor of earth and environmental sciences and computer science, as president.
The ESIP Federation is a consortium of Earth science data and technology professionals spanning government (NASA, NOAA, USGS, NSF), academia, and the private sectors, both commercial and nonprofit. The organization is dedicated to transforming research data and information into useful and usable data and information products for scientists, decision makers, policy makers, and the public. The Foundation for Earth Science provides management services to the ESIP Federation.
Peter Fox
“The ESIP Federation’s evolution during the past 15 years has allowed it to emerge as an important innovation hub for technological, data and expertise exchange,” said Fox, who began his tenure Jan. 10. “The ESIP Federation has attracted new leadership who represent the growing diversity of the ESIP Federation itself. From its inception to address key NASA data system requirements, the ESIP Federation now regularly works across agencies, disciplines, and sectors to advance Earth science informatics and data systems.”
Fox joined Rensselaer in 2008 after 17 years at the High Altitude Observatory of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, where he served as chief computational scientist. His research specializes in the fields of solar and solar-terrestrial physics, computational and computer science, information technology, and distributed semantic data frameworks. This research utilizes state-of-the-art modeling techniques, Internet-based technologies, including the Semantic Web, and applies them to large-scale distributed scientific repositories addressing the full lifecycle of data and information within specific science and engineering disciplines as well as among disciplines.
Fox is currently principal investigator for the Integrated Ecosystem Assessment, the Deep Carbon Observatory Data Science, the Global Change Information System, and the GeoData projects. He has spent more than 28 years bridging science and distributed data and information systems to support community activities utilizing use case-driven design.
He was awarded the 2012 Martha Maiden Lifetime Achievement Award for service to the earth science information community, and the 2012 European Geosciences Union Ian McHarg/Earth and Space Science Informatics Medal.