EASC2410: Data Analysis and Modeling for Earth Sciences

Computing skills are fundamental to modern Earth and planetary sciences. This course introduces Python as a practical scientific tool for analysing data, creating visualizations, testing quantitative ideas, and building reproducible workflows around real geoscience problems.

Learning objectives

Students develop the ability to:

• write clear Python programs using current Python 3;
• work with arrays, tabular data, and scientific file formats;
• clean, explore, visualize, and interpret geoscience datasets;
• apply basic statistical and numerical methods;
• build simple models of Earth-system processes; and
• document and communicate computational results reproducibly.

Core topics

1. Python fundamentals, functions, and debugging
2. NumPy arrays and numerical computing
3. Data management and analysis with pandas
4. Scientific visualization with Matplotlib
5. Probability, distributions, correlation, and regression
6. Spatial and time-series data
7. Numerical modelling and simulation
8. Reproducible scientific workflows

Current schedules, assessment details, software instructions, and notebooks are provided to enrolled students through HKU’s learning platform.

Academic integrity and responsible computing

Collaboration and use of appropriate computational resources are encouraged, but submitted work must demonstrate each student’s own understanding. Reused code, data, ideas, and AI assistance must be disclosed and attributed in accordance with course and University requirements.