RING finds its origin in the long tradition of combined engineering and Geosciences of the Nancy School of Geology, which has considered computer programming as part of the modern geologist's toolbox since the time of punch cards. Following the development of several automatic contouring methods in the 70's and 80's (GEOL, Cartolab), the research group increased its international recognition since the gOcad project was initiated in 1989 by Prof. Jean-Laurent Mallet.
Subsurface models are essential to build knowledge and support decisions about natural resources, energy transition and hazard management, but they can be affected by large uncertainties due to the lack and incompleteness of subsurface data. We perform Research for Integrative Numerical Geology to better account for geological concepts in interpretation of geoscientific data and to sample and reduce the associated uncertainties. Our ultimate objective is to effectively describe geological objects with evolving and adaptative numerical models, integrating geometry and physics at various space and time scales, with real-time updates. This translates into theoretical work and novel technologies to efficiently represent, build, update and ask questions to deterministic and stochastic subsurface models.
Our research primarily focuses on the geometry, topology and properties of geological objects. It is declined into four main research areas:
One of the goal of our research group is to develop new software and technologies. Consortium sponsors can use and industrialize software, royalty-free. In addition to internal use of software by sponsors, several commercial software products or open-source projects have been based on RING technologies.