Interactive physical data cubes: A novel perspective for exploring Earth system dynamics

Söchting, Maximilian; Mahecha, Miguel D.

doi:10.5194/esd-17-687-2026

Articles | Volume 17, issue 3

https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-17-687-2026

© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-17-687-2026

© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 17, issue 3

Perspective

|

10 Jun 2026

Perspective |

| 10 Jun 2026

Interactive physical data cubes: A novel perspective for exploring Earth system dynamics

Maximilian Söchting and Miguel D. Mahecha

Data sets

CAMS global reanalysis (EAC4) Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service https://doi.org/10.24381/d58bbf47

Model code and software

msoechting/lexcube: v2.0.1 (v2.0.1) Maximilian Söchting https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20304813

Lexcube: Interactive Visualization of Large Earth System Data Cubes Maximilian Söchting et al. https://doi.org/10.1109/mcg.2023.3321989

Interactive Earth system data cube visualization in Jupyter notebooks Maximilian Söchting et al. https://doi.org/10.1080/20964471.2025.2471646

Video supplement

Interactive physical data cubes: A novel perspective for exploring Earth system dynamics Maximilian Söchting and Miguel D. Mahecha https://doi.org/10.5446/73082

Short summary

As the amount of data collected by satellites and generated by climate models to monitor Earth's climate and environment continues to expand in size and complexity, it becomes increasingly difficult for non-experts to explore these type of data sets. We present an interactive physical exhibit in the shape of a cube that enables anyone to explore these large environmental data sets across space, time, and variables, independent of their technical knowledge, through direct physical interaction.