Geophysics in the Cloud (GITC) is Back!

Geophysics in the Cloud (GITC) is an annual competition hosted by the Geophysical Society of Houston's Data Science and Machine Learning Group in partnership with Amazon Web Service's AWS Energy Team. The goal of GITC is to advance the knowledge of energy professionals in cloud technologies and machine learning applications.

Geophysics in the Cloud 2021 - Chapter 1

In 2021, we launched a successful first edition of the competition. GITC21 focused on machine learning techniques to predict rock properties at blind well locations within a larger seismic volume. GITC21 had 74 teams competing across seven different time zones, ranging from undergraduate students to seasoned industry professionals.

To keep things fun, we designed the competition around the lore of a fictional character named "KABEAL." The parallel fictional storyline involves KABEAL, a young geoscientist trapped in an 8-bit world by an evil wizard who loathed new ideas and technologies.

Fun Fact: K.A.B.E.A.L. is an acronym for the first names of the original six members of the GITC core team: Kyle (Jones), Altay (Sansal), Ben (Lasscock), Eduardo (Alvarez), Ayo (Babalola), and Liz (Dennette).

Over the course of 3-weeks, we helped over 100 participants tackle a challenging subsurface application. Thanks to our partners at AWS, each participant had access to virtually unlimited cloud computing inside of AWS' Sagemaker service. Aside from the competition itself, here are some of the aspects that made GITC21 an overwhelming success:

• Virtual metaverse opening ceremonies w/ talks from cloud and domain experts
• Friday metaverse workshops/Happy Hours
• Virtually 24/7 mentor hotline
• The competition community forum and virtual networking
• Winners presented solutions to AWS leaders and Geophysical Community

By the end of GITC21, we had all gained invaluable knowledge, expanded our networks, and, dare I say - made a few friends along the way. There's even evidence that some participants were able to land jobs through the network they developed within GITC.

GITC22 Chapter 2: "Mission Code Name: Wildcatter"

GITC22 "Mission Code Name: Wildcatter" is our 2nd edition of GITC and the coming of age of KABEAL, our friendly GITC guide. We will release the "Mission Code Name: Wildcatter" lore in just a few weeks.

In GITC22, we will explore an exciting application of machine learning in energy and reinforcement learning for field development. We have unlocked some exciting potential in the early tests that Altay Sansal and I performed. Unlike GITC21, GITC22 will focus on creating long-term value for the community through an open-source library called "Wildcatter." More information on this is coming soon!

GITC22 is set to kick off on August 8th and end on Sunday, August 26th. If you have questions about the event, please get in touch with us through our dedicated SIG email geoscienceml@gmail.com.

Register your team today

GITC Core Team: Eduardo Alvarez, Altay Sansal, Ben Lasscock, John O'Donnell, Agnibha Das, Vishal Das, Daniel Kahn, and Kyle Jones.

Thank you to our Sponsors: Amazon Web Services (AWS), Enthought, and Quantico Energy Solutions

For more information on the GSH, our parent organization, please visit https://gshtx.org/.