A database for a multi-institutional environment monitoring program

A several year program is underway in Israel for monitoring a wastewater reclamation and storage complex for agriculture irrigation. The program covers wastewater treatment and storage, irrigation, aquifers, air pollution, crops, soil, geography and meteorology, and is operated by one Principal Institution and several Participant Institutions. The institutions feed their data to a central database. Multi-institutional databases are fed by research teams whose areas of activity are traditionally unrelated. The main problem of the Database Administrator consists in combining data created by different methods under different basic assumptions. And to make them available to investigators from several disciplines and institutions who are used to different data analysis procedures. Database Administrator's background should cover both computer and environmental sciences fields. The selection of a flexible multipurpose software is recommended, but there are several decisions on database design that depend not on the software but on the characteristics and requirements of the Monitoring Program. Entering the data from different sources in independent files facilitates input, debugging, administrative control of the contribution of each institution, and changes in units and parameters. This multi-file design also overcomes difficulties due to excessive file size, and better matchs the actual usage of the database in a multi-institutional program. To enter the data with their original characteristics and units also matchs better the database usage. Ready-to-use routines for file merging and unit conversion, and debugging and documentation needs are also discussed. The Database-User interactions are the mechanism that maintains an evolving dynamic Database.