Big data challenges in ocean observation: a survey

摘要

Ocean observation plays an essential role in ocean exploration. Ocean science is entering into big data era with the exponentially growth of information technology and advances in ocean observatories. Ocean observatories are collections of platforms capable of carrying sensors to sample the ocean over appropriate spatiotem-poral scales. Data collected by these platforms help answer a range of fundamental and applied research questions. Many countries are spending considerable amount of resources on ocean observing programs for various purposes. Given the huge volume, diverse types, sustained measurement, and potential uses of ocean observing data, it is a typical kind of big data, namely marine big data. The traditional data-centric infrastructure is insufficient to deal with new challenges arising in ocean science. New distributed, large-scale modern infrastructure backbone is urgently required. This paper discusses some possible strategies to solve marine big data challenges in the phases of data storage, data computing, and analysis. Some applications in physics, chemistry, geology, and biology illustrate the significant uses of marine big data. Finally, we highlight some challenges and key issues in marine big data.