Lost in Translation? How Terminologies Improve Data Discovery in Earth System Science

The volume of research data has been increasing rapidly for years, driven by technological developments and the growing recognition of data as a primary research output. At the same time, many studies require substantial financial and technical investments, research data are often not reproducible due to transient environmental conditions or political constraints, and scientific questions increasingly span multiple disciplines. These challenges are particularly pronounced in Earth System Science (ESS), which combines high spatial and temporal resolution observations and simulations with strong societal relevance, given the global impact of climate change on virtually all aspects of everyday life. Together, these factors underscore the urgent need for improved interoperability and reusability of scientific information.

Despite ongoing efforts, though, discovering relevant research data in domain-specific repositories often still requires detailed knowledge of disciplinary conventions, terminology, and practices for documentation, communication, and recherche. As one scientist aptly stated: 'You have to know what you are looking for in order to find something useful.' Which poses a significant barrier to cross-disciplinary research and limits the reuse potential of existing data.

Building on the previous comics in this series, which introduced the role of ontologies and terminologies in improving (cross-disciplinary) search, the third comic focuses on concrete enhancements to data discovery at the World Data Center for Climate (WDCC). In continuation of last year’s work, additional features to facilitate search and discovery are being explored, again relying on the systematic use of terminologies provided through a terminology service.

Terminologies constitute a core element of the technical language used within scientific communities. Key characteristics include well-defined concerted technical terms with unambiguous identifiers, rich descriptions, and explicit relationships both within a single terminology and across different terminologies. Their use supports standardization while enabling interoperability between datasets originating from different domains, disciplines, and research communities.
Terminology services (TSs) sustainably provide access to such terminologies through graphical user interfaces (GUIs) and application programming interfaces (APIs). They offer centralised, up-to-date information on the terminologies and their terms, properties, and semantic relationships, and can be seamlessly integrated into data repositories and search infrastructures. By incorporating terminology-based search and exploration features, repositories such as WDCC can lower entry barriers for users, support semantic search, and ultimately improve the findability and reuse of research data.

Through the comic format, this contribution motivates and illustrates these concepts, demonstrating how terminologies and terminology services can support FAIR data principles in practice and how semantic technologies can bridge disciplinary boundaries in Earth System Science.