Web-gis Based Collaboration Environment Using Scientific Data of the Moon

On 14 September 2007, the first Japanese large-scaled lunar explorer “Kaguya” (SELENE), developed by JAXA (Japan Aerospace and Exploration Agency) was launched. Kaguya successfully reached moon in October 2007, and started nominal operation from 21 December 2007, As of the end of April 2008, Kaguya is conducting lunar surface observation from lunar polar orbit. Kaguya will acquire large amount of lunar data including lunar surface pictures and mineral composition, topographic features (altitude) and many other scientific data. By combining a number of scientific data sets, lunar scientists are anticipating that they can answer longstanding riddles of the moon such as the birth of the moon, lunar interior structure and local and regional lunar geology. Therefore, a scientific platform which enables to gather observation information and scientific result, compare and discuss is required. The key and base data of the science integration will be the camera data, as the camera data is the fundamentals to construct lunar map which will be the start point for lunar research. Kaguya has three scientific camera, Multiband Imager (MI), Spectral Profiler (SP) and Terrain Camera (TC), and the collective designation of these three cameras are LISM (Lunar Imager / SpectroMeter). Based on LISM data and altitude data obtained by laser altimeter, we are now constructing lunar topographic data display and collaboration system. This system is based on the WebGIS concept and includes basic display function and collaboration capability (data uploading and downloading, online discussion capability, content recording). The system is also a modern example for scientific collaboration tool and data mash-up platform. In this paper, we will present about the objectives of the development and current implementation situation.