Science On a Sphere (SOS) is a spherical projection system created by the United States

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA ) is an American scientific and regulatory agency charged with Weather forecasting, forecasting weather, monitoring oceanic and atmospheric conditions, Hydrography, charting the seas, ...

(NOAA). It displays high-resolution video on a suspended globe with the aim of better representing global phenomena. Animated images of atmospheric storms,

climate change Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in Global surface temperature, global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. Climate variability and change, Climate change in ...

, and

ocean temperature The ocean temperature plays a crucial role in the global climate system, ocean currents and for marine habitats. It varies depending on depth, geographical location and season. Not only does the temperature differ in seawater, so does the salin ...

can be displayed on the sphere to display environmental processes. SOS systems are most frequently installed in

science museums A science museum is a museum devoted primarily to science. Older science museums tended to concentrate on static displays of objects related to natural history, paleontology, geology, industry and industrial machinery, etc. Modern trends in mu ...

universities A university () is an educational institution, institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly ...

zoos A zoo (short for zoological garden; also called an animal park or menagerie) is a facility where animals are kept within enclosures for public exhibition and often bred for conservation purposes. The term ''zoological garden'' refers to zoology, ...

, and

research institutions A research institute, research centre, or research organization is an establishment founded for doing research. Research institutes may specialize in basic research or may be oriented to applied research. Although the term often implies natural sc ...

History

SOS was invented by Alexander E. MacDonald, the former director of the

Earth System Research Laboratories The Earth System Research Laboratories (ESRL) is an alliance of four NOAA scientific labs, all located in the David Skaggs Research Center on the Department of Commerce campus in Boulder, Colorado. Organized under NOAA's Office of Oceanic and At ...

. MacDonald devised the original idea for SOS in 1995. A team of NOAA staff wrote the SOS software and developed the SOS hardware and system architecture. A patent was awarded to NOAA for Science On a Sphere in August 2005.

Configuration

SOS uses many off-the-shelf hardware and software components. A spherical screen covered in ordinary latex paint hangs suspended in the center of the projection space. The screen is inert; it neither moves nor has any electronic parts. Surrounding the screen are four video projectors, with each projector responsible for one quadrant of screen space. One CPU is used to control the system. The SOS software runs on

Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...

The sphere

The carbon fiber sphere is in diameter and weighs under . The sphere is attached to the ceiling or suspension structure with a three-point suspension system to hold the sphere in place and reduce lateral movement and blurring.

Projectors

The system requires high quality, bright, long-duty cycle projectors, rather than smaller portable and consumer models to endure the requirements of 8–10 hours per day, 7 days per week of most public displays.

Computer hardware

The newest configuration uses one Ubuntu Linux computer with NVIDIA Quadro graphics cards, and an iPad app to control the system.

SOS data details

The majority of SOS assets are so-called "datasets". Originally conceived as a video system for showing space-based collections of Earth data, the SOS has grown in its utility. The majority of data that traditionally appears on the SOS screens concerns the Earth, either from near-real-time data acquisition systems, or from processed remote sensing platforms, but recent interest and growth in different kinds of media have started to broaden that library. There are currently over 500 datasets that can be shown on the sphere, including real-time

infrared Infrared (IR; sometimes called infrared light) is electromagnetic radiation (EMR) with wavelengths longer than that of visible light but shorter than microwaves. The infrared spectral band begins with the waves that are just longer than those ...

satellite images, Mars, real-time earthquakes, an

ocean acidification Ocean acidification is the ongoing decrease in the pH of the Earth's ocean. Between 1950 and 2020, the average pH of the ocean surface fell from approximately 8.15 to 8.05. Carbon dioxide emissions from human activities are the primary cause of ...

model, and others, including a number of movies. The data format for SOS datasets is the

equirectangular projection The equirectangular projection (also called the equidistant cylindrical projection or la carte parallélogrammatique projection), and which includes the special case of the plate carrée projection (also called the geographic projection, lat/l ...

, as shown by the map to the right.

SOS User's Collaborative Network

A collaborative network has been established by institutions with access to SOS, as well as partners who are developing educational programming and content for these systems. The SOS Users Collaborative Network is backed by the NOAA Office of Education (OEd) and the NOAA Earth System Research Laboratories (ESRL).

References

External links

BWC Visual Technology
A distributor and installer of Science on a Sphere *
SOS Explorer
the desktop version of SOS for Windows and Mac computers, was released in September 2015 and is free for classroom or personal use. {{DEFAULTSORT:Science On A Sphere Display technology Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research Science and technology in the United States Spheres