Biography

Dr. Haipeng Li is an Associate Researcher at Chengdu University of Technology. He specializes in merging geology with AI and information theory. Dr. Li is the architect behind the "TimeMachine Paleogeography Reconstruction Platform https://docs.deeptime.world/" and is dedicated to advancing quantitative frameworks in paleogeographic research. He currently holds the position of the Secretary-General of the International Association for Paleogeography (IAP).

Abstract

Empowering TopoAsia: The IAP TimeMachine Platform as a Collaborative Infrastructure for Pan-Asian Deep-Time Research

Haipeng Li¹, Mingcai Hou¹, Christian Verard², Christopher Scotese³, Han Cheng¹, and Chengshan Wang⁴

¹ Institute of Sedimentary Geology, Chengdu University of Technology, Chengdu, China

² Department of Earth Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland

³ Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Northwestern University, Evanston, USA

⁴ School of Earth Sciences and Resources, China University of Geosciences, Beijing, China

The TopoAsia International Research Initiative aims to unravel the complex deep-shallow coupling of the Asian continent by uniting over 250 experts across 30 countries. However, realizing the initiative's "Four Co-Principles"—specifically Co-Building and Co-Sharing—requires overcoming significant technical hurdles, including fragmented regional datasets, siloed software environments, and reproducibility challenges. This presentation introduces the TimeMachine platform, developed by the International Association for Paleogeography (IAP), as a critical cyber-infrastructure designed to operationalize TopoAsia’s collaborative mission.

TimeMachine (https://deeptime.world/) is a novel, browser-based platform that democratizes access to advanced paleogeographic reconstruction. By leveraging GPU-accelerated rasterization and cloud-based architecture, the platform integrates multiple global plate motion models with comprehensive geological, paleontological, and paleoclimatic databases into a single, intuitive interface. We demonstrate how TimeMachine serves as the technological backbone for TopoAsia by:

1. Facilitating Co-Building: Enabling researchers from diverse disciplines (geology to geodynamics) to project local datasets onto high-resolution global maps without specialized hardware.
2. Enhancing Co-Sharing: Providing a unified spatiotemporal framework where data and models are transparent, interoperable, and easily shared via cloud-based project management.
3. Supporting Co-Planning: allowing real-time visualization of data gaps to prioritize future transnational research questions.

Through a case study on Cretaceous paleogeographic reconstruction, we illustrate how TimeMachine transforms the efficiency and accessibility of deep-time analysis. By replacing static, traditional workflows with dynamic, reproducible modeling, TimeMachine provides the necessary infrastructure to advance TopoAsia’s goal of an open, equitable, and integrated pan-Asian Earth system research network.