Computing as New Paradigm for Collaborative Problem Solving and Shared Resources Management in Environmental Sciences

Cloud computing is establishing worldwide as a new high-performance computing paradigm that offers formidable possibilities to industry and science. In this chapter, we discuss the impact of this paradigm change to scientific research. After introducing the basic concepts of cloud computing and discussing briefly the recent technological developments that led to its emergence, two cloud computing portals are presented as examples for a trend that will drastically change the way in which scientific research will be done in the future. We will discuss and exemplify why a cloud computing science portal offers, besides the obvious advantages over locally installed software packages such as computing power and storage capacity, completely new possibilities for scientific research, collaboration, education, and presentation of reproducible results.