Guide to e-Science

e-Science supports the scientific lifecycle

e-Science provides the computing, data storage and networking infrastructure required by today's advanced science facilities to support the complete scientific lifecycle, from background research, through simulation and experimental design, data collection and analysis to publication.

Traditionally, science involved two main pillars: theory to generate hypotheses and experimentation to test them. In modern science, theories are complex, data volumes are large, and experimental teams are often international collaborations. At the end of the 20th century a third pillar of e-Science was added to the scientific process to manage these new realities of science.

Today, STFC e-Science provides a broad range of services to support science across the UK and beyond. In the last 40 years e-Science and its predecessor organisations have made significant contributions to scientific computing which are described in the sections linked to on the right, along with the policy issues which guide today's e-Science strategy.

STFC e-Science provides services to researchers funded by all the UK research councils. To ensure future technologies meet the needs of researchers, and to develop new services e-Science collaborates with computer science researchers and development companies as well as scientific researchers. Both users and collaborators include researchers in universities, research laboratories and commercial companies throughout the UK, Europe and the world in a broad range of disciplines. Further details of collaborators and users of e-Science services are available by following the related link on the right.