The Open Session on Geosciences Instrumentation is the only European forum with an open call for professional conference papers in the field of Geosciences Instrumentation, Methods, Software and Data Systems. The session aims to inform the scientific and engineering geosciences communities about new and/or improved instrumentation and methods, and their related new or existing applications. The session also deals with new ways of utilizing observational data by novel approaches and the required data infrastructure design and organization.

Review talks on specific topics will be accepted on the basis of invitation by the conveners. Please contact the conveners if you have a topic that may be suitable for a review talk.

The session is open to all branches of geosciences measurement techniques, including, but not limited to, optical, electromagnetic, seismic, acoustic and gravity. The session is intended as an open forum and discussion between representatives of different fields within geosciences is strongly encouraged. Past experience has shown that such mutual exchange and cross fertilization between fields have been very successful and can open up for a break-through in frontier problems of modern geosciences.

The session is also open for applications related to environmental monitoring and security providing, like archeological surveys, rubbish deposits studies, unexploded ordnance and/or mines detection, water dam inspection, seismic hazards monitoring etc.

The nature of science has changed: it has become more interconnected, collaborative, multidisciplinary, and data intensive. Accordingly, the main aim of this session is to create a common space for interdisciplinary scientific discussion, where EGU-GA delegates involved in geoscientific networks can share ideas and present the research activities carried out in their networks. The session represents an invaluable opportunity for different networks and their members to identify possible synergies and establish new collaborations, find novel links between disciplines, and design innovative research approaches.

Part of the session will be focused on COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology) Actions*. The first edition of the session (successfully held in 2018) was actually entirely dedicated to the COST networking programme and hosted scientific contributions stemming from 25 Actions, covering different areas of the geosciences (sky, earth and subsurface monitoring, terrestrial life and ecosystems, earth's changing climate and natural hazards, sustainable management of resources and urban development, environmental contaminants, and big data management). Inspiring and fruitful discussions took place; the session was very well attended. We are looking forward to continuing the dialogue this year and to receiving new contributions from COST Action Members.

Another part of the session will be dedicated to the activities of other national and international scientific networks, associations, as well teams of scientists who are carrying out collaborative research projects.

Finally, the session is of course open to everyone! Accordingly, abstracts authored by scientists not involved in wide scientific networks are most welcome, too! In fact, in 2018 we received a good number of such abstracts, submitted by individual scientists or small research teams who wished to disseminate the results of their studies in front of the multidisciplinary audience that characterizes this session, as an alternative to making a presentation in a thematic session. This may be a productive way to broaden the perspective and find new partners for future interdisciplinary research ventures. We hope to receive this kind of abstracts this year, as well.


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* COST (www.cost.eu) is a EU-funded programme that enables researchers to set up their interdisciplinary research networks (the “Actions”), in Europe and beyond. COST provides funds for organising conferences, workshops, meetings, training schools, short scientific exchanges and other networking activities in a wide range of scientific topics. Academia, industry, public- and private-sector laboratories work together in Actions, sharing knowledge, leveraging diversity, and pulling resources. Every Action has a main objective, defined goals and clear deliverables. This session was started as a follow up initiative of COST Action TU1208 “Civil engineering applications of Ground Penetrating Radar” (2013-2017, www.GPRadar.eu).

Geoscience witnessed a flurry of major breakthroughs in the 19th and 20th century, leading to major shifts in our understanding of the Earth system. Such breakthroughs included new concepts, such as plate tectonics and sequence stratigraphy, and new techniques, like radiometric dating and remote sensing. However, the pace of these discoveries has declined, raising the question of whether we have now made all of the key geoscience breakthroughs. Put another way, have we reached “Peak Geoscience” and are we now in a time of synthesis, incremental development and consolidation? Or are there new breakthroughs on the horizon? If so what will these developments be?

One key remaining challenge is the management of the inherent uncertainties in geoscience. Despite the importance of understanding uncertainty, it is often neglected by interpreters, geomodellers and experimentalists. With ever-more powerful computers and the advent of big data analytics and machine learning, our ability to quantify uncertainty in geological interpretation, models and experiments will be crucial.

This session aims to bring together those with an interest in the future of geoscience. We welcome contributions from any field of geoscience which either demonstrate a new, disruptive geoscience breakthrough or provide insights into where the next breakthrough will come. We encourage contributions associated with uncertainty in geoscience models and data, machine learning or big data analytics.

State-of-the-art environmental research infrastructures become increasingly complex and costly, often requiring integration of different equipment, services, and data, as well as extensive international collaboration. Clear and measurable impact of the research Infrastructures is therefore needed in order to justify such investments (from member states and the EU) - whether it is an impact in terms of knowledge, developments in the environmental field of science, new innovative approaches, capacity-building or other socio-economic impacts. Moreover, improving the impact supports the long-term sustainability of the research infrastructures.

This session aims at discussing how to best monitor, interpret, and assess the efficiency and impact of environmental and Earth system research infrastructures. Even more importantly, the session seeks a breadth of contributions, with focus on ways to increase and improve the impact of research infrastructures, not only through the scientific outcomes they produce, but also, for example, through increasing the number of touchpoints with other actors in the society, or awareness of the services they offer- whether this is enhanced by lobbying, direct cooperation with industrial partners, or any other action. Talks on how to enhance the impact through the strategic communications activities are especially welcome.

The originality of the session is to emphasize on the central position of human activities in environmental research (both terrestrial and atmospheric), as a driving factor and/or a response, by combining different spatio-temporal scales.
Continental environments (under various climatic conditions) experience profound societal and physical changes, which prompt scientists to investigate the complex interactions between environmental functioning and human activities.
The complexity originates from the multiplicity of factors involved and resulting spatial and temporal variabilities, of their multiple origins in time (historical integration) and/or legacy.
As a consequence, causal links in this societal-environmental relationship are difficult to establish but, it is fundamental to understand these causal links to adapt, conserve, protect, preserve and restore the functioning of the environment as well as human activities. From this point of view, the geographical approach highlights the relationships (or their absence) through the expression of the spatial and temporal trajectories of the processes studied by clarifying the observation of signals.
The ensuing issues on the relevance of indicators used in different supports of nowadays research (imagery, archives, models ...) are raised as a methodological open up.
In this context, oral and poster presentations dealing with any studies related to the following issue(s) are welcome:
- human forcing on the environments and environmental resilience
- response of socio-systems to environmental changes
- scenarios, prospective and retrospective models of the evolution of environments and human activities
- management modes (adaptive management) of anthropised continental environments, reciprocity, mutual benefits (ecosystem services), positive feedback

The session may include the following methodological aspects:
- in situ metrology,
- statistical and numerical modeling,
- spatio-temporal analysis,
- remote Sensing,
- surveys,
- landscape analysis,
- paleoenvironmental approach,
at various scales:
- spatial scales, from the station and site through watershed,
- time scales from the event to the Holocene.

Climate change, globalization, urbanization, and increased interconnectedness between
physical, human, and technological systems pose major challenges to disaster risk reduction
(DRR). Subsequently, economic losses caused by natural hazards are increasing in many regions of the world, which call for novel scientific approaches and new types of data collection to integrate the study of the natural processes triggering hazards, with the study of socioeconomic, political and technical factors that shape exposure and vulnerability.

This session aims to gather contributions on research, empirical studies, and observations that are useful for understanding and unravel the nexus between physical, human, and technological systems in DRR. We have identified a few examples of empirical puzzles where knowledge that is more fundamental is needed, thus contributions on the following topics are particularly welcome (but not limited to):

- Failure is a potential source of lesson-drawing, but history also offers success stories where disasters were avoided that deserve more rigorous assessment – What can we learn from comparative studies?

- Why do some societies that experience frequent natural hazards increase their resilience, while others become more vulnerable?

- Why do lowering hazard levels sometimes paradoxically lead to increased risks in some places?

- Why – despite major progress in understanding drivers of risk and developing enhanced methodologies and tools for assessing it – do we still see an increase in impacts associated with natural hazards?

In recent years an increasing number of research projects focused on natural hazards (NH) and climate change impacts, providing a variety of information to end user or to scientists working on related topics.

The session aims at promoting new and innovative studies, experiences and models to improve risk management and communication about natural hazards to different end users.

End users such as decision and policy makers or the general public, need information to be easy and quickly interpretable, properly contextualized, and therefore specifically tailored to their needs. On the other hand, scientists coming from different disciplines related to natural hazards and climate change (e.g., economists, sociologists), need more complete dataset to be integrated in their analysis. By facilitating data access and evaluation, as well as promoting open access to create a level playing field for non-funded scientists, data can be more readily used for scientific discovery and societal benefits. However, the new scientific advancements are not only represented by big/comprehensive dataset, geo-information and earth-observation architectures and services or new IT communication technologies (location-based tools, games, virtual and augmented reality technologies, and so on), but also by methods in order to communicate risk uncertainty as well as associated spatio-temporal dynamic and involve stakeholders in risk management processes.

However, data and approaches are often fragmented across literature and among geospatial/natural hazard communities, with an evident lack of coherence. Furthermore, there is not a unique approach of communicating information to the different audiences. Rather, several interdisciplinary techniques and efforts can be applied in order to simplify access, evaluation, and exploration to data.

This session encourages critical reflection on natural risk mitigation and communication practices and provides an opportunity for geoscience communicators to share best methods and tools in this field. Contributions – especially from Early Career Scientists – are solicited that address these issues, and which have a clear objective and research methodology. Case studies, and other experiences are also welcome as long as they are rigorously presented and evaluated.

New and innovative abstract contributions are particularly welcomed and their authors will be invited to submit the full paper on a special issue on an related-topics Journal.

In cooperation with NhET (Natural hazard Early career scientists Team).