backgrounder: e-Science
e-Science, also called e-Research or cyberinfrastructure, will be the topic of Session 2, Stream B "Research 2.0: e-Science and new ways of interaction in the science community".
Originally the term encompassed mainly large science projects, using grid computing in order to provide a powerful technology platform for distributed science.
However, with the rise of the participative web, and more widely-available computing and more participants in science networks, including students and science libraries, the scope of discussion is expanding to cover many network-enabled science activities on the Internet. Part of the promise of e-Science is the idea of a unified science workflow system, that can connect instruments with computation, data with visualisation, and allow powerful analysis. One can imagine the capabilities of such an e-Science infrastructure extending beyond just researchers to decisionmakers and citizens as well.
Some nations have national programs in this area. While by no means an exhaustive list, these include
One of the most active areas of investigation is related to the tremendous amounts of data that can be produced by new experiments or new simulations, and how to manage, distribute, and archive those data.
The efforts of various study groups have provided a number of very informative reports in different areas of e-Science. These include:
There are also ongoing studies, including:
- e-SciDR - Towards a European e-Infrastructure for e-Science Digital Repositories