What is our intention.
TESSIN – Terrestrial Environmental System Simulation and INtegration
TESSIN is an open research platform of the Helmholtz Center for Environmental Research with a focus on modeling terrestrial environmental systems (TES). Examples of TES e.g. are hydrological, geological and biological systems.
TESSIN fosters the development of different methodologies for the description of TES such as process-based and agent-based modeling approaches.
Highlights ...
The graphic shows an example of a coupled hydrosystems model for a hydrological catchment (Selke catchment in the TERENO Bode observatory). Surface processes are represented by a mesoscale hydrological model (mHM) coupled to a numerical model for the subsurface (OpenGeoSys).
The coupling of the OGS and mHM codes was realized by Wenqing Wang (ENVIN) and Luis Samaniego (CHS). The coupled OGS/mHM allows the simulation of hydrological processes at catchment scale. The next step is including mass and energy fluxes into large scale analysis.
The figure shows the visualisation of the structure of a mixed-species forest. Different colours represent different tree species groups. We analyse the dynamics of forest ecosystems using individual-based vegetation models (e.g. FORMIND forest model). Our models are used to analyze the impacts of disturbances, to evaluate management strategies, to calculate carbon balances for vegetation and to understand the role of species richness for ecosystem functions.
From 2010 the UFZ is involved into the Helmholtz "Energy" program. Groß Schönebeck is one of the most important geothermal research locations in Germany which is operated by the GeoForschungsZentrum Potsdam. TESSIN is involved into the geothermal reservoir simulation. The development of numerical methods should help to improve the understanding of thermo-hydro-mechanical procceses during reservoir operation. The figure depicts the flow field in the geothermal reservoir reflecting the influence of the artificial fracture system (see -> TESSIN projects for more details). This project is part of the PhD thesis of Norihiro Watanabe (see -> TESSIN people, see -> HIGRADE).
