Geoscientific Model Development - the EGU’s software journal

Computer modelling underpins vast areas of the geosciences, and the development of those models is itself a major scientific undertaking. GMD provides the forum for the publication of new developments in software across the geosciences. We communicate the advances made in geoscientific modelling capability, and thereby provide recognition to the many scientists who undertake this form of research. Equally importantly, we provide a key link in the provenance chain of geoscientific modelling. Every time a model result informs the conclusions of a scientific paper, the reader should be able to understand the basis of that calculation, its assumptions and limitations. In other words, the details of the computer model used to produce a scientific result should themselves be published. GMD provides the venue for that publication.

 

We take our role in establishing the provenance of scientific results very seriously. GMD publications are required, whenever legally possible, to be accompanied by complete, public, and persistent archives of the software and data used to create the results presented: our authors are required to show their working. By doing this, we provide readers with a detailed access to what models actually do that goes far beyond the summary descriptions that fit in a research paper. 

 

GMD’s scope spans the geosciences. Papers describe fluid and solid models of the atmosphere, ocean, cryosphere, surface, lithosphere, and core. Specialist publications deal with individual parametrisations, while survey papers cover entire Earth System Models. Data assimilation papers discuss the incorporation of observed data, using ensemble, variational and machine learning techniques. Technical papers cover new algorithms and ports to new hardware, as well as new standards for data and interfaces. In essence, any paper about any stage of the development of software for the geosciences is in scope.