Since computers came into existence people have continually worked to update them with more powerful machines. This is the case with any person’s home computer, but it is also the case with specially created machines that are used only for scientific research. A house computer would stand no chance of gathering, holding and analysing data that is collected through scientific research, which is why the continual advancement of e-Science is so important.
The communication of scientific information, consisting of large amounts of data, is also something that only e-Science has the ability to cater for. As man continues to strive for discovery and insight, so must the technology through which such insights be made advance.
e-Science is the basis around which science is working to achieve new discoveries and advancement to improve areas ranging from medicine to dentistry. As the technology scientists use to conduct their research becomes more technological and powerful, so must the ability to store the corresponding data. E-Science is the tool that offers scientists a scope to store, interpret, analyse and network their data to other work groups. e-Science will play a major role in every facet of scientific research, starting out with the initial theory-based research, testing through simulation, systematically controlled testing, collection of data in an organised manner and the corresponding interpretation of said data.
e-Science is not something that mere individuals can work to accomplish. As computer software is so complex and the data needs of scientific research is so great, you will find that it is always large teams, consisting of multi-disciplined personnel, who work on e-Science projects. These are typically groups made up of well-founded universities, government bodies and research laboratories. e-Science in the UK at the moment is evidence of this, with groups such as the National Grid Service and the North-East Regional e-Science Centre paving the way for advancement in science. Computer capacity is the only way that scientific research is to advance.
e-Science is essential to any advances that are to be made in science. Over the years the aspirations and goals of scientists has furthered, but without e-Science, such inspirational thinking would have fallen at the first hurdle. Whether it is a scientific theory or hypotheses (the initial processes involved before conducting any actual experimentation), there is still the need to be able to collect great amounts of data.
It is also a fact that scientific research requires professionals from varying cross-disciplines. However, it is now also the case that such research typically requires the input, knowledge and scientific skills of scientists across the globe. This makes the ability of e-Science to relate large amounts of data and information across the globe of immense importance.
If science is to develop and new discoveries are to be made, then e-Science will be the one to stimulate such innovation. Research units across the UK are working as single entities, and also as corresponding groups, in order to sate the technological advances that are needed if scientific knowledge and understanding is to increase. There is still much that we don’t know. For example, there are still diseases that have no known cure, mysterious anomalies that we are unable to explain and frontiers that have not yet been crossed.
If such questions and irregularities are to be answered then the innovative techniques of e-Science will be essential. E-Science provides scientists and researchers with the architecture through which they can work to discover the unknown. Without the storage capacity and ease with which data can be communicated across the globe, science would end up standing still.