Scientific research and development has always involved large numbers of people, with different types and levels of expertise, working in a variety of roles, both separately and together, making use of and extending the body of knowledge. In recent years, however, there have been a number of important changes in the nature and the process of research. In particular, there is an increased emphasis on collaboration between large teams, an increased use of advanced information processing techniques, and an increased need to share results and observations between participants who are not physically co-located | 17 The Semantic Grid a future e-Science infrastructure David De Roure Nicholas R. Jennings and Nigel R. Shadbolt University of Southampton Southampton United Kingdom INTRODUCTION Scientific research and development has always involved large numbers of people with different types and levels of expertise working in a variety of roles both separately and together making use of and extending the body of knowledge. In recent years however there have been a number of important changes in the nature and the process of research. In particular there is an increased emphasis on collaboration between large teams an increased use of advanced information processing techniques and an increased need to share results and observations between participants who are not physically co-located. When taken together these trends mean that researchers are increasingly relying on computer and communication technologies as an intrinsic part of their everyday research activity. At present the key communication technologies are predominantly e-mail and the Web. Together these have shown a glimpse of what is possible however to more fully support the e-Scientist the next generation of technology will need to be much richer more flexible and much easier to use. Against this background this chapter focuses on the requirements the design and implementation issues and the Grid Computing - Making the Global Infrastructure a Reality. Edited by F. Berman A. Hey and G. Fox 2003 John Wiley Sons Ltd ISBN 0-470-85319-0 438 DAVID DE ROURE NICHOLAS R. JENNINGS AND NIGEL R. SHADBOLT research challenges associated with developing a computing infrastructure to support future e-Science. The computing infrastructure for e-Science is commonly referred to as the Grid 1 and this is therefore the term we will use here. This terminology is chosen to connote the idea of a power grid that is that e-Scientists can plug into the e-Science computing infrastructure like plugging into a power grid. An important point .
