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“New U.S. Research Will Aim at Flood of Digital Data”

Apache Point telescope, Sloan Digital Sky Survey

Steve Lohr writes in The New York Times:

“The federal government is beginning a major research initiative in big data computing.  The effort, which will be announced on Thursday, involves several government agencies and departments, and commitments for the programs total $200 million.

“Administration officials compare the initiative to past government research support for high-speed networking and supercomputing centers, which have had an impact in areas like climate science and Web browsing software.

“‘This has that level of importance,’ said Tom Kalil, deputy director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. ‘The future of computing is not just big iron. It’s big data.’ …

“‘There is recognition by a broad range of federal agencies that further advances in big data management and analysis are critical to achieving their missions,’ said Edward Lazowska, a computer scientist at the University of Washington. ‘It doesn’t matter whether the mission is national defense, energy efficiency, evidence-based health care, education, or scientific discovery.'”

Read the article here.  c|net version here.  Read about the University of Washington eScience Institute here.