An old and familiar adage is that “the best geologist is the one who has seen the most rocks”. Meaning: While the basic laws of physics apply everywhere on our planet, the inherent chaos of the natural world leads to localized phenomena that most often refine – and sometimes challenge – broader understandings. The more rocks a geologist encounters, the better she/he becomes at interpreting a new environment.
In a blog post from 2012, Dr. Kim Kastens, an oceanographer from Columbia University, offered an alternate ending to the old saying, adding: “… or the one who has seen the most data.” Especially in today’s world, where data is everything, this addition seems most appropriate.
But what does it mean to “see” data? There are obviously many ways to look at data, from eye-straining scrolls through endless rows of Excel, to running slick visualization scripts and cutting cross-sections in 3D models. It is rare that one methodology offers a complete spatial and temporal view of a given site.
Here is a data visualization method that I call “Data DNA”, for the main reason that it reminds me of genomic data visualization, but also because, like DNA, it is a unique impression of a given site. I will describe how one can use this visualization in context of hydrological analysis, but naturally this use can extend to other fields as well.
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