iSamples Interactive Explorer

Search, filter, and explore 6.7 million material samples

parquet
spatial
h3
performance
isamples

  1. Instant (<1s): Pre-aggregated H3 res4 summary (580 KB) → 38K colored circles
  2. Zoom in: Automatically switches to res6 (112K) then res8 (176K) clusters
  3. Zoom deeper (<120 km): Individual sample points from 60 MB lite parquet
  4. Click: Cluster info or individual sample card with full metadata
  5. Search: Find samples by name — results fly to the location on the globe

Circle size = log(sample count). Color = dominant data source.

Loading…Resolution
0Clusters Loaded
0Samples Loaded
-Load Time

Material

Sampled Feature

Specimen Type

Loading H3 global overview…

Click a cluster or sample on the globe

0.1 Results

Loading samples matching your filters…

1 How It Works

The globe loads progressively: a 580 KB pre-aggregated H3 res4 file paints the world in clusters within ~1 s, finer-grained res6 / res8 files swap in as you zoom, and only when you zoom past 120 km altitude does the explorer switch to individual sample points (capped at the Max Samples slider, viewport-bounded). The results table below the globe queries the 60 MB lite parquet for samples matching your filters — independent of the camera. Filters compose at sample zoom (and in the results table and search): source + material + sampled feature + specimen type all apply via a join on the facets parquet. At cluster zoom, the H3 tier files only carry one row per (h3_cell, dominant_source), so source filtering matches on each cell’s dominant source — two consequences worth knowing: (1) a cell whose dominant source is OpenContext disappears entirely when you uncheck OpenContext, even if some of its samples are from sources that remain checked; (2) a cell whose dominant source is OpenContext stays visible with its full sample_count when OpenContext is checked, even though some samples in it may be from sources you unchecked. Material / sampled feature / specimen filters don’t apply at cluster zoom at all (the tier files aren’t pre-filtered by those facets) — they kick in once you zoom into sample mode, in the results table, and in search.

Phase Data Size Points
Instant H3 res4 580 KB 38K clusters (continental)
Zoom in H3 res6 1.6 MB 112K clusters (city)
Zoom more H3 res8 2.5 MB 176K clusters (neighborhood)
Zoom deep Map lite 60 MB (range req.) Up to Max Samples slider value (default 25K, max 100K) individual samples in viewport
Click sample Full dataset ~280 MB (range req.) Full metadata for 1 sample

All queries run in your browser via DuckDB-WASM with HTTP range requests — only the bytes you need are transferred. No backend.

2 See Also