Working Groups Annual Meeting 2026

Joint Cyberinfrastructure Working Groups and ESS-DIVE Annual Meeting 2026

Virtual Meeting May 12-14, 2026

The theme this year will focus on “AI-Ready Data and Models”. This free and virtual event is a chance for modelers, data contributors and data users to join forces, fostering the exchange of valuable insights and expertise on BER data. Whether you are new to the BER program, CIWGs, and ESS-DIVE, or have been engaging for a while, this is your opportunity to learn about the latest updates and AI-approaches within our community, and help drive the future of BER data management, integration, and use.

Participation

  • Organized in collaboration with the ESS-DIVE Annual Meeting, May 13-14, 2026.
  • Virtual participation via Zoom (A unique link is sent to you when you register).
  • Register here for the meeting Zoom details.
  • See the ESS-DIVE Annual Meeting events page for detailed Day 2 and Day 3 agendas.

Agenda

Day 1: May 12, 2026.

9:00-9:10 Welcome, meeting objectives and structure, orientation to goals
9:10-9:20 Remarks from BER (Paul Bayer)
9:20-9:50 Cyberinfrastructure Working Groups (CIWG Leads)
Moderator: David Moulton
  • Data Management
  • Data-Model Integration
  • Software Engineering and Interoperability
  • Computing Infrastructure
  • AI/ML
9:50-10:05 ESS-DIVE Updates (Charuleka Varadharajan and Shreyas Cholia)
  • ESS-DIVE AI-readiness perspective
10:05-10:20 ESGF Update (Forrest Hoffman)
  • New architecture, data publication, and intake-esgf
  • Rapid Evaluation Framework (REF)
10:20-10:30 ESS AI Roundtable Report out (Pamela Weisenhorn)
10:30-11:00 Perspectives on AI-Ready Data
Moderator: Terri Velliquette
  • Is AI-Ready data really a thing? What is it? (Terri Velliquette)
  • Demystifying jargon for AI-assisted science (Roelof Versteeg)
  • Where is DOE at?
    • ModCon & AmSC (Shreyas Cholia)
    • BRIDGE (Kjiersten Fagnan)
11:00-11:30
Lunch Break
11:30-12:30 ModEx in the AI Era : Modeling and Writing
(Moderators: Vanessa/David)
Generative AI is supporting a growing suite of tools that is expanding the variety of models that can be leveraged in efforts to advance our scientific understanding and how those results are communicated.
  • Scott Painter (ORNL), The shifting role of process-based models in the era of AI.
  • Dan Lu (ORNL), ORBIT: AI foundation model for Earth system prediction.
  • James Stegen (PNNL), Disclosure isn’t enough: Enforceable best practices for LLM-assisted scientific writing.
Discussion
12:30-1:45 ModEx in the AI Era: AI assisted coding and model-data integration
(Moderator: Forrest)
Generative AI is supporting a growing suite of tools that is accelerating how we develop code to integrate data from a range of sources into our models, how developers and users interact with codes, and what automated or AI assisted workflows are possible.
  • Sundar Niroula (PNNL), Increasing the Value of Collected Data with Time Series Foundation Models.
  • Roelof Versteeg (Subsurface Insights), Exposing Fused Heterogeneous Data to Agentic AI through Tools, Skills, and an MCP Server and thoughts on orchestration.
  • Jinyun Tang (LBNL), AI-enabled data integration into ecosystem models, the EcoSIM-co-scientist.
  • Ethan Coon (ORNL), AI assisted coding with Agentic Coding Tools to expand Watershed Workflow’s capabilities, scripting, and documentation.
  • Vanessa Garayburu-Caruso and Xingyuan Chen (PNNL), Using Vibe Coding to Refactor the Lambda-PFLOTRAN Workflow
Discussion
1:45-2:00 CIWGs Planning (David Moulton)
  • Feedback, Priorities and Upcoming events
  • AI/ML is planning training sessions
  • Looking forward to Day 2 and Day 3 of the meeting
2:00 Adjourn

Day 2: May 13, 2026.

For a detailed agenda of the Day 2 (May 13) meeting, you can visit the ESS-DIVE Annual Meeting events page

Day 3: May 13, 2026.

For a detailed agenda of the Day 3 (May 14) meeting, you can visit the ESS-DIVE Annual Meeting events page