The Computational Infrastructure for Geodynamics (CIG) is a community-driven organization that advances Earth science by developing and disseminating software for

geophysics Geophysics () is a subject of natural science concerned with the physical processes and Physical property, properties of Earth and its surrounding space environment, and the use of quantitative methods for their analysis. Geophysicists conduct i ...

and related fields. It is a

National Science Foundation The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) is an Independent agencies of the United States government#Examples of independent agencies, independent agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government that su ...

-sponsored collaborative effort to improve geodynamic modelling and develop, support, and disseminate

open-source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use and view the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open source model is a decentrali ...

software Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...

for the

geodynamics Geodynamics is a subfield of geophysics dealing with dynamics of the Earth. It applies physics, chemistry and mathematics to the understanding of how mantle convection leads to plate tectonics and geologic phenomena such as seafloor spreading, ...

research and higher education communities. CIG is located at the

University of California, Davis The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Davis, California, United States. It is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University ...

, and is a member-governed consortium with 62 US institutional members and 15 international affiliates.

History

CIG was established in 2005 in response to the need for coordinated development and dissemination of software for geodynamics applications. Founded with an NSF cooperative agreement to

Caltech The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech) is a private university, private research university in Pasadena, California, United States. The university is responsible for many modern scientific advancements and is among a small g ...

, in 2010, CIG moved to

UC Davis The University of California, Davis (UC Davis, UCD, or Davis) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Davis, California, United States. It is the northernmost of the ten campuses of the University ...

under a new cooperative agreement from NSF.

Software

CIG hosts open source software in a wide range of disciplines and topic areas, such as

computational science Computational science, also known as scientific computing, technical computing or scientific computation (SC), is a division of science, and more specifically the Computer Sciences, which uses advanced computing capabilities to understand and s ...

, seismology, mantle convection, long-term tectonics, and short-term crustal dynamics.

Software Attribution for Geoscience Applications (SAGA)

CIG started the SAGA project with an NSF EAGER award from the SBE Office of Multidisciplinary Activities for "Development of Software Citation Methodology for Open Source Computational Science".

References

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External links

* Earth sciences software infrastructure organizations Geodynamics {{geophysics-stub