An interesting short article on Research’s fourth paradigm, something that Jim Gray used to talk about a lot. Here’s the concluding paragraph:

Data-intensive science will be integral to many future scientific endeavors, but demands specialized skills and analysis tools. In addition, the research community now has the option of accessing storage and computing resources on demand. The IT industry is building huge data centers, far beyond the financial scope of universities and national laboratories. These “cloud services” provide high-bandwidth access to cost-effective storage and computing services. However, there are no clear examples of successful scientific applications of clouds yet; making optimum use of such services will require some radical rethinking in the research community. In the future, the rapidity with which any given discipline advances is likely to depend on how well the community acquires the necessary expertise in database, workflow management, visualization, and cloud computing technologies. (“Beyond the Data Deluge” by Gordon Bell, Tony Hey, Alex Szalay)