The Solid Earth SAmple Registry (SESAR) addresses the urgent need for unique sample identifiers in the development of a Geoscience Cyberinfrastructure. The project will build a web-based digital registry for solid earth samples that will provide for the first time a way to uniquely name and identify samples on a global scale, along with the generation of barcodes, with a user-friendly interface. Establishing such system will have a wide-ranging impact on sample and data management, especially with respect to sample sharing and data integration.
SESAR is a response to the problem of ambiguous naming of samples, which has been a major obstacle in the development of a Geosciences Cyberinfrastructure. Different samples are often given identical names, and the same sample is often renamed, making it difficult to link disparate data for a sample in relational databases. Through the ability to track a sample through its history, the system will facilitate the ability of investigators to build on previously collected data on samples as new measurements are made or techniques are developed. The unique identifiers will also dramatically advance interoperability among information systems for sample-based data, opening an extensive range of new opportunities for discovery and for interdisciplinary approaches in research.
SESAR will have a dramatic impact on the future of the Geosciences, as several major existing and emerging data and information management projects that handle sample-based data, such as CHRONOS, EarthChem, SedDB, PaleoStrat - to name a few - are seriously hampered in their potential to link disparate data for samples and develop interoperability among the systems by the inability to uniquely identify samples. The Solid Earth SAmple Registry (SESAR) will allow wide ranges of sample-based data types to be linked and integrated, thus leading to new interdisciplinary approaches in research.
