SimSphere: A Biosphere/Atmosphere Simulation
SimSphere is a soil/vegetation/atmosphere/transfer (SVAT) model that simulates the interactions among soil, plant, and atmospheric systems and the transfer of energy, momentum, and water through the systems. It was created by Penn State meteorology professor Toby N. Carlson and a team of developers and instructional designers, with contributions and major revisions at a later stage by Dr George P. Petropoulos.
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The SimSphere package, consists of an interactive model written in Java, a 13-chapter student workbook, and a Users' guide. The student workbook introduces simple concepts and the software reinforces them. Users have the option of running the model as an applet from a web browser or downloading the model to a Microsoft Windows®-based personal computer and running it as a stand-alone application.
The package is designed for undergraduates, graduate students, and professionals in disciplines such as geography, meteorology, landscape architecture, and civil engineering. SimSphere apart from its use as a stand-alone application it can be used synergistically with optical and thermal infrared Earth Observation data from either aircrafts or satellites to derive regional estimates of soil surface moisture content and energy fluxes (latent and sensible heat fluxes), both instantaneous and daytime averages.
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This software product is released under the terms of the GNU General Public Licence (http://www.gnu.org/lisences)
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To cite the model when use it in your work, please use the following citations:
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Carlson, T.N.; Boland, F.E. Analysis of urban-rural canopy using a surface heat flux/temperature model. Journal of Applied Meteorology, 1978, 17, pp: 998-1013
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Petropoulos, G., Carlson, T.N. and M. J., Wooster (2009): An Overview of the Use of the SimSphere Soil Vegetation Atmosphere Transfer (SVAT) Model for the Study of Land-Atmosphere Interactions. Sensors, 2009, 9(6), 4286-4308, [Download from Here]
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A User's SimSphere group has been set up on LinkedIn as "The SimSphere Land Biosphere Model Users Group"; please sign up if you would like to join the group or email George Petropoulos (petropoulos.george@gmail.com) requesting a personal invite to join in
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A special issue on SimSphere model exploitation is currently open for contributions to the open access journal Geoscientific Model Developments. This special issue hosts contributions concerned with descriptions of further upgrades of SimSphere or its exploitation in any way. It comprises articles on model development or applications involving the model; this includes – but is not limited to – studies exploring hypothetical scenario examination, model validation, sensitivity analysis and synergies of it with EO data. More information about the special issue and the submission process can be found HERE
A mirror site of the SimSphere web page for Africa is hosted by the University of Bouira, Algeria and can be found HERE
Running the SimSphere Model
You can download a Java application (0.96mb)
Minimum System Requirements: Windows 95/98/NT/2000 with Java Runtime Environment 2.4 or later.
User Guides
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Software User's Guide (pdf, 931kb)
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Technical Background Manual (pdf, 355kb)
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Screenshots
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Dissemination
Credits
Initial model development:
@ 2003 Pennsylvania State University (PSU) Department of Meteorology, USA.
@ 2016, Major Revisions, Maintenance : Aberystwyth University (AU), Wales, United Kingdom & INFOCOSMOS Ltd, Greece
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DEVELOPMENT TEAM
Aberystwyth University (UK):
George P. Petropoulos – Former Faculty
Pennsylvania State University (USA):
Toby Carlson – Former Faculty
Karen Peters – Instructional design
Tim Summers – Lead programmer
David Ripley – Model programmer
Brian Shook - Database backend programmer
Jason Meyer – Programmer
Sudhanshu Thanedar – Programmer
INFOCOSMOS Ltd (Greece):
Yiannis Konstas – Programmer