Committee for the Preservation of Samples & Cores

Reports, Minutes

Committee for the Preservation of Samples & Cores Meeting Minutes (click on date to see the minutes):

• Annual Report for Fiscal Year 1999
• Annual Report for Fiscal Year 2000 
• Report from February 2001
• Minutes from the Conference Call of 4/05/2001
• Minutes from the Annual Meeting - 6/04/2001

Minutes:  Committee on Core and Sample Preservation Meeting
June 4, 2001, Denver, Colorado

The committee met from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m., Monday, June 4, 2001 in the Gold Coin Room, Marriott City Center Hotel, Denver, Colorado.  Highlights of the reports and discussion:

• Chris Maples, Chairman of the National Research Council study on Geoscience Data and Collections described the study activities and schedule that will lead to a final report in March 2002.  The NRC committee meeting in Denver June 7 ? 9, is scheduled to include tours of the US Geological Survey Core Research Center, the National Ice Core Laboratory, Denver Earth Resources Library and the Boulder National Geophysical Data Center.  
   
• Chris Keane and Marcus Milling, American Geological Institute, provided an update of their work on the National Geoscience Data Repository System:  data is being incorporated into Geotrek at an accelerating rate; funding for Geotrek is unsure when the current Federal grant expires at the end of 2001; AGI is hoping that the March 2002 NRC study will identify multiple government agencies that could provide future funding; the site receives about 500 ? 600 unique users per month. 

Comments from the committee regarding Geotrek:  the AGI needs to do more to publicize its accomplishments; this committee should work with AGI to update the directory of repositories; the Geotrek user interface is too slow and requires the user to know the type of data needed rather than providing all data for a location; greater interaction between AGI and the state repositories and regulatory agencies is encouraged. 

The committee encourages AGI to increase communication with public/state repositories, perhaps through a periodic newsletter.  This could contribute to increased the amounts of data being provided to AGI.  Communication of lessons learned and best practices would also help states that are starting to automate their data.    

• Tim Carr described the Kansas Geological Survey online system for data management and distribution.   Committee members were impressed with the large variety of visual and tabular data in the system and the ease of use.  We  asked Tim to provide supplementary information on system costs and its links to Geotrek.  It was also suggested that the Kansas example might be incorporated in a ?best practices?  article for the AAPG Explorer.
   
• The committee proposed these future actions:  work with AGI to update the Catalogue of Data Repositories; Explorer articles on ?best practices? for core preservation, the NRC study, and/or use of core in research; develop presentation material on the benefits of public/state repositories.
   
• A conference call will be scheduled this summer to discuss implementation of next year?s activities and projects.

Participants:

Edie Allison, Marvin Carlson, Doug Patchen, Bob Hulse, Marcus Milling, Christopher Keane, Chris Maples, Dan Halgerson, Bill Ellington, Tony Kolodzoij, Sherilyn Williams-Stroud, Chuck Noll, Don Lewis, Larry Knauer, Julie LeFever, Bill Gwilliam, and Tim Carr.