Database for primary school education using NOAA AVHRR

Education which uses information technology is needed in Japan. Moreover, primary school education should consider environmental problems. We have built a satellite image database based on AVHRR data which can easily be used by primary school children. This database consists of every-day images of local areas together with images of typical natural phenomena which are difficult to understand by looking at the ground such as typhoons, floods, and forest fires. We cut off only a portion of a specific local area and make the images available on the database. The image data are received in real time at Tohoku University every day. All schools do not have a broadband network so we compressed the data more than that on other research databases allowing access to be made simply on any network.