On Three Dimensional Geosciences Spatial Modeling

On the viewpoint of generalized geographical system or geosciences system,and based on the application demands for 3D GIS (Geographical Information System) and 3D GMS (Geosciences Modeling System),four goal-levels for 3D geosciences spatial modeling named respectively Ⅰ-3D visualization,Ⅱ-3D inquiry,Ⅲ-3D analysis and Ⅳ-engineering application,are suggested in this paper.The related system functions demanded for the four goal-levels are comparatively analyzed.Referring to present situation and future development direction of domain 3D geosciences spatial modeling,six key issues respectively being the geosciences object cognition,spatial model dimension,spatial model suitability,3D manipulation on 2D screen,3D spatial topological relationship description and 3D spatial model updating are discussed,and eleven foreland questions related waiting for soon answer are proposed.Besides,other eight key theoretical or technical issues waiting for urgent research and solution are presented,which include the cognition and understanding of geo-data with different structure from multi-sources,the integration and representation of geo-data with different quality from multi-sources,the distributing management of massive geo-data,the parallel treatment and model computation for 3D geo-data,the data mining and knowledge discovery from geo-data with multi-scales,the geo-spatial model for the integration of surface-terrain-subsurface objects,the precision of spatial model and its reliability analysis,and the data organization for the seamless integration of engineering excavation.