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        NSF has several Environmental Observatory (EO) initiatives for which developing and applying mathematical models are expected to be prominent cross-cutting, methodological activities. These activities also link, benefit from, and catalyze the innovations in cyberinfrastructure and sensors and sensor networks expected within the ambitions of the EOs. Because of the strategic significance of environmental modeling, leaders in the broad disciplines involved in the EOs are being convened in a cross-disciplinary workshop to be held in Tucson, Arizona in mid-May 2006. Based in part upon the workshop, an associated project, coordinated by the University of Georgia, will produce a white paper on "Grand Challenges of the Future for Environmental Modeling". The workshop (and subsequent Paper) are designed to stimulate answers to the following questions: What new technologies for observing, simulating, and tele-communicating will emerge over the next 5-10 years; how will they change the grand challenges for modeling, what will those challenges be, and how might those challenges be pursued, under the scenario of any one of the EO initiatives being realized?

Models and the Growth of Knowledge
It has been said that knowledge accumulates through "acts", whereby prior "concepts (theory)" are reconciled with observed "given data." Anticipated advances in sensors and sensor networks within NSF's EOs will enlarge the scope and detail of the "given data" substantially. Likewise, advances in cyberinfrastructure and computing, will enable advances in "concepts (theory)" that can be realized in simulation models. Beyond examining progress towards the new challenges opened up by virtual realities and the ways in which models can assist in designing observation networks and identifying needs for novel sensors, the workshop also will investigate algorithmic advances and adaptations of software for scientific visualization that could become available in the near future to support our capacity to reconcile theory with observation (the "acts"). Models are complex assemblies of multiple, constituent hypotheses that must be tested against the new streams of field data to be generated by the EOs. Working out novel ways of conducting these tests, within an environmental cyberinfrastructure, will be a major scientific challenge associated with the EOs.

Models and Environmental Stewardship
Just as significant will be the challenges of employing models at the Science-Society interface, in formulating potential policy options, in communicating scientific notions to communities of stakeholders, and in handling the uncertainties bound up with such uses of models. Society is increasingly familiar with the role of models in simulating the behavior of environmental systems and their use in exploring the "reachability" of society's hopes and fears for the future. The EOs will generate new insights into present and past behavior, and modeling will be central to forecasting future conditions and generating environmental foresight for the public. The workshop will explore opportunities for using models in education and community learning enabled by the EO initiatives.

Research Community Network
Last, but not least, the workshop should have a positive impact on the community of researchers engaged in modeling across the disciplines involved in the EOs. The organizers hope it will serve as the basis for developing a more enduring forum in which to exchange experiences and promote cross-fertilization of insights through pooling the rich diversity of their separate traditions.



  
     
     
     
     

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