Examination of Database Supported Spatio - Temporal Intersection

The quickly increasing number of spatio-temporal applications in fields like environmental monitoring, geology and mobile communication is a new challenge to the development of geo-databases. However, the query functionality of today ́s geo-information systems is still limited to the thematic attributes of spatial objects and to spatial 2D objects. In this paper we present two examples for the definition and database implementation of spatiotemporal intersection operations to be used in geo-scientific 3D/4D applications: the intersection of a spatio-temporal object with a given axis-aligned bounding box and the intersection of a spatio-temporal object with a user-defined 3D plane. Both operations are implemented within the GeoToolKit project. We then show the application of the two operations within two geoscientific applications: the balanced restoration of the Lower Rhine Basin and the generation of artificial, time-dependent landform data in 3D space, respectively. Finally, we give an outlook on our future research work on spatio-temporal database operations.