This project will develop components of a polar cyberinfrastructure (CI) to support researchers and users for data discovery and access. The main goal is to provide tools that will enable a better access to polar data and information, hence allowing to spend more time on analysis and research, and significantly less time on discover and searching. At the end of the project, the PIs will deliver a large-scale web crawler to continuously mine the Internet to discover dispersed polar data and a quality monitoring tool allowing polar data reformulation. Beside identifying polar data in major data repositories, the crawler will be able to bring individual hidden resources forward, hence increasing the discoverability of polar data. Quality and assessment of data resources will be analyzed, providing a key tool for not only identifying issues but also to connect the research community with optimal data resources.

The project will impact several disciplines, users and communities of practice - within and beyond the polar sciences. The broader impacts include the improved discoverability of data and better access so that the time spent searching the data could be reduced (and hence used for research purposes). The data quality and crawler components of the work will be made available to the scientific community to serve future purposes and support additional work. Moreover, the project will also contribute to the growth of a 'cyberpolar' community, through the collaboration of computer scientists focusing on specific polar issues. Results will be incorporated into lessons and hands-on experience for undergraduate and graduate students through classroom activities and two PhD students will be involved full time for the duration of the project.