Author: Martin H. Trauth

For years, I’ve taught courses on academic writing and presenting, co-authored a book with designer Elisabeth Sillmann, and evaluated portfolios comprising abstracts, posters, and oral presentations. However, with the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022, I had to revamp my course because most of the teaching methods I used were now feasible for AI. And Elisabeth and I had to rewrite our book—which had since become two books, one for MATLAB and one for Python (Trauth and Sillmann, 2026a, b). Continue reading “Teaching and Examining Geosciences in the Age of AI”

The popular online course on data analysis in the geosciences will be taught bilingual using the two leading programming languages and development environments MATLAB and Python in parallel on 14–18 September 2026. The course is based on my books MATLAB Recipes for Earth Science (Springer 2025) and Python Recipes for Earth Sciences (Springer 2024).

Continue reading “63rd Online Shortcourse on MATLAB & Python Recipes for Earth Sciences”

More than 30 years ago, I began teaching compact courses on data analysis in the earth sciences. 22 years ago, I started thinking about writing textbooks. Now there are six textbooks – the seventh book is in press – and many different course formats for you. Here is an overview of the current options! Continue reading “Online Courses in Modern Data Analysis Methods in Earth Sciences with Python and MATLAB”

Wikipedia, celebrating its 25th birthday, is facing numerous challenges. Christian Schiffer, writing for German Tagesschau.de highlights the dwindling number of contributors, the struggle against AI, and the exploitation of AI chatbots. Additionally, Wikipedia has been inundated with AI-generated content, leading to a decline in reader engagement.  Continue reading “Happy Birthday, Wikipedia. Seriously.”

AI changed everything, also the way we search for literature, create figures, and write summaries. Teaching a course on collecting, processing and presenting geoscientific information and having published two editions of a book on the topic, it was time for a change. And two new books. Continue reading “Collecting, Processing, and Presenting in the Age of AI”

As in previous years, the Python and MATLAS Recipes for Earth Sciences books are once again in the top 100 at Springer Earth Sciences & Environment. Many thanks to all my readers who still buy the books, some of them in print, even though they are sold by Springer in large bundles to libraries!

Young people—as I was back then—do not really appreciate how quickly their valuable data, painstakingly created graphics, and carefully crafted texts can become unreadable. Here are a few thoughts on this and a recommendation. Continue reading “Sustainability of Geoscientific Information”

Working with quantitative data, which requires sophisticated mathematical and computer-assisted evaluation methods, came very late in the geological sciences, compared to other scientific disciplines. Unfortunately, in many geology courses worldwide university-level mathematics and computational geosciences is not included, as my experience – as the current chair of the examination committee of our geoscience masters program – from processing this year’s masters applications suggests. Continue reading “How to Become a Geoscience Data Analyst”