CrossTalk: A Simulation Platform for the Linking of Existing Soil, Plant and Atmosphere Models

The recycling of existing soil, plant and atmosphere models to simulate soil-plant-atmosphere systems faces two important issues: the connection of several models allowing true multi-disciplinary simulations and the organisation of a core of functionalities that are common to many simulations. We propose a design pattern, based on a set of communication rules and relationships, which allows the combination of submodels operating at various spatial and temporal scales (a plant model may drive cellular models of meristematic activity and whole-plant models of C transport). This idea is implemented in a new simulation platform (CrossTalk) illustrated here with a simulation linking a soil water-transport model (WAVE, Fortran), a shoot architecture model (MacTom, C) and a root architecture model (RootTyp, Java), none of which had been designed with the intention to be used as Lego blocks in a larger simulation framework.