Welcome to cores2code!

Welcome to cores2code!#

Cores to Code (C2C) is a 3-week summer research program that brings together fieldwork, lab work, and computational science to explore the earthquake and tsunami history of the Cascadia subduction zone. This Jupyter Book is the digital resource for the final week of the program, where you’ll transition from physical field samples to digital data analysis using Python.

🧭 Program Overview#

Hosted by CRESCENT (Cascadia Region Earthquake Science Center), the C2C program provides undergraduates with an immersive experience in geoscience research. The program is structured into three parts:

  • Week 1 – Fieldwork: Explore coastal sites and collect sediment cores.

  • Week 2 – Lab Work: Analyze cores, identify microfossils, and interpret past geologic events.

  • Week 3 – Data & Code: Learn to work with and visualize data using Python.

This Jupyter Book focuses on Week 3 and introduces foundational skills in scientific computing.

🎯 Learning Goals for Week 3#

By the end of this module, you will be able to:

  • Write and run Python code in Jupyter Notebooks

  • Load and process tabular geoscience datasets

  • Create effective visualizations using matplotlib and plotly

  • Understand basic data cleaning and summarization

  • Apply computational thinking to geological problems

These skills will help you transform your field and lab data into reproducible scientific insights.

🧰 Tools You’ll Be Using#

This book introduces several important tools and libraries:

  • Python – General-purpose programming language

  • Jupyter Notebooks – Interactive coding and documentation environment

  • Pandas – For data loading and manipulation

  • Matplotlib / Plotly – For static and interactive data visualization

  • NumPy – For numerical operations

If you’re new to coding, don’t worry—everything starts from the basics!

👩‍🔬 Who Is This For?#

This book is intended for undergraduate students in Earth Sciences with little or no prior coding experience. The capstone example is grounded in real data collected during the program, making your learning experience as relevant and hands-on as possible.

🎓 About CRESCENT#

CRESCENT is the nation’s first subduction zone earthquake science center. Its goals are to:

  • Advance scientific understanding of Cascadia and other subduction zones

  • Foster collaboration between research institutions and public agencies

  • Train the next generation of diverse, interdisciplinary geoscientists

C2C is part of CRESCENT’s Geoscience Education & Inclusion (GEI) initiative and is led by a consortium of instructors from:

  • Cal Poly Humboldt

  • University of Oregon

  • Oregon State University

  • Virginia Tech

  • UNC Wilmington

🙌 Get Started#

Use the table of contents to the left to navigate through the Python tutorials, exercises, and resources. Start with the “Introduction to Python” notebook and work your way through at your own pace.

We’re glad you’re here—let’s turn your cores into code!

Contents