e-Science 101

Methods of Computational Science and Engineering - Fall'07
1:00-2:30PM Tuesday & Thursday in Powell-Booth 100
home - course description - schedule - lecturers - blog - wiki

Lecture 1

Part I: Introductory Comments - S.G. Djorgovski

Class logistics and motivation. Placing our goals in a broader framework: how is information technology and computation changing the way science is done.

Slides (pdf file)

Some relevant links:

• e-Science activities at Caltech
• J. Wing's ACM article "Computational Thinking" (2006): local pdf file
• Extracts from the Nature v. 440, 23Mar06 issue, on e-Science (provided for the Caltech internal educational use only)
• The NSF Cyber-Infrastructure Vision (March 2007): local pdf file | link
• Microsoft Research's 2020 eScience initiative

Other Readings:

• "Atkins" Report of Blue-Ribbon Advisory Panel on Cyberinfrastructure (2003) local pdf file | link
• Other NSF OCI reports
• PITAC report "Computational Science: Ensuring America's Competitiveness" (2005): local pdf file | Other PITAC reports
• NITRD report on Grand Challenges (Nov. 2006): local pdf file | Other NITRD reports
• National Academies' Report "Rising Above the Gathering Storm" (2007): local pdf file | NAP link
• G. Wilsons's AmSci article "Where's the Real Bottleneck in Scientific Computing?" (2006): local pdf file

Assignment Read some of this stuff, and think about it.

Part II: Wikis for Scientific Communication - A. Mahabal

Wikis and blogs are among the new communication tools for scientists. Wikis can be thought of as a communal lab book, and blogs as a conversational forum, both also capturing a record of the ideas, conversations, and procedures which is typically not saved in any other form.

Slides (pdf file)

Some relevant links:

• Amaya, W3C's web browser
• PmWiki, Wiki for collaborations:
• WordPress, blogtool and weblog platform

Assignment Use our class wiki (edit something) and blog (submit something).