The EarthCube BALTO broker (Brokered Alignment of Long-Tail; Observations) provides streamlined access to both long-tail and big data; using Web Services through several distinct mechanisms. First, we; updated the OPeNDAP framework Hyrax, software that serves big data from; USGS, NASA, and other sources, with a BALTO extension that tags dataset; landing pages with JSON-LD encoding automatically. Therefore, the big; data made available through Hyrax are now searchable via EarthCube; GeoCODES (formerly P418) and Google Dataset Search. The BALTO broker; extension to Hyrax makes thousands of datasets easily searchable and; accessible. Second, we focused our efforts on a geodynamics use-case; aimed at advancing our understanding of continental rifting processes; through the use of an NSF mantle convection code called ASPECT. By; addressing this use-case, we implemented a web services brokering; capability in ASPECT that allows for remotely accessing datasets via a; URL defined in an ASPECT parameter file. Third, through another use-case; in ASPECT aimed at testing hypotheses involving global mantle flow, we; developed a brokering mechanism for a “plug-in” that accesses NetCDF; seismic tomography data from the NSF seismology facility IRIS, then; transforms it into the format needed by ASPECT to run global mantle flow; models constrained by seismic tomography. Fourth, we demonstrate methods; to allow any scientist or citizen scientist to make their in-situ IoT; based sensor data collection efforts available to the world. Finally, we; are developing a Jupyter Notebook with a GUI that allows for users to; search Hyrax servers for big datasets and long-tail data. These; cyberinfrastructure developments comprise the entire EarthCube BALTO; brokering capabilities.
