Modeling and Querying Scientific Simulation Mesh Data

Scientific simulation is gaining attention as an inexpensive means of experimentation in scientific computing, as is the data generated by the simulation. Scientific simulation typically generates mesh data, i.e., data in a grid structure, in a sequence of time steps. The data is complex, as is the file structure. Understanding these involves analyzing the topology and geometry of grid points, and the fields at those points. Currently, there is no data model, nor query language, accepted widely for this kind of data. In our work, we developed a compact, generic model of simulation mesh data, and validated the model through implementation using a standard query language on an object-oriented database. In this paper, we present the generic model, its implementation, and ideas for improving queries in our model. To our knowledge, our work is the first successful attempt of modeling and querying scientific simulation mesh data.