A service-oriented infrastructure for ecological niche modelling. / Uma infraestrutura orientada a serviços para a modelagem de nicho ecológico.

AUTOR(ES)
DATA DE PUBLICAÇÃO

2009

RESUMO

Ecological niche modelling combines environmental data and information about the occurrence of a species to obtain models to describe its probabilistic distribution in a region. Computational algorithms generate models based on the hypothesis that, if a species was found under the conditions which define its niche, then it may survive in any place which offers the same conditions. The modelling technique usually applies data obtained from different providers, in large quantities and different formats, and the results are exported to other analysis and interpretation tools, such as GIS, Geographic Information Systems. Information systems available for ecological niche modelling are monolithic and, although they effectively implement algorithms for model generation, they were not designed to meet all modelling requirements. This work defines a more comprehensive solution, a service-oriented infrastructure for ecological niche modelling. The choice of a service-oriented solution is directly related to system integrations requirements. The infrastructure specifies a service bus to manage services with many features, such as routing and delivery, and to treat interoperability issues. Before building the infrastructure, the ecological niche modelling process was formalized. It allows defining the problem domain, identifying failures, gaps and potential evolutions, and increasing the learning curve of beginners. Having the infrastructure defined, other modelling aspects were addressed, resulting in integrated solutions for some of the identified problems of the technique. In algorithms for model generation, a solution using adaptive technology was introduced, with promising results. In high performance computing, the Garp, one of the algorithms most applied for modelling, became parallel. Besides positive results related to performance, this initiative showed how to evolve in this sense. Related to integration with other providers and availability of resources offered by other software tools, a proposal to integrate GIS services was presented, applying patterns for geospatial services. Together, these solutions show the ability of the infrastructure to meet all identified requirements and to evolve in order to incorporate new features that the natural evolution of modelling techniques may develop in the future. Incorporating the proposed solutions to the infrastructure, a portal of ecological niche modelling was developed to serve the users of this technique. Ecological niche modelling presents challenges in different areas of knowledge and the adopted approach allowed formalizing them. Research work is ongoing and includes model evaluation, bus services evolution, ontologies development and incorporation of legacy systems, with several potential benefits for ecological niche modelling. As an additional result, the development of this work indicates that the solution may be extended to other domains, such as precision agriculture and pollinators, showing the versatility and the potential of the presented services infrastructure.

ASSUNTO(S)

systems integration integração biodiversity software patterns biodiversidade software architecture padrões de software arquitetura de software

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