Information science

From The Book of THoTH (Leaves of Wisdom)

Information science is an interdisciplinary science primarily concerned with the collection, classification, manipulation, storage, retrieval and dissemination of information.Merriam-Webster and American Herritage Dictionary. Information science studies the application and usage of knowledge in organizations, and the interaction between people, organizations and information systems. It is often, though not exclusively, studied as a branch of computer science and is closely related to the cognitive and social sciences.

Information Science focuses on understanding problems from the perspective of the stakeholders involved and then applying information (and other) technology as needed. In other words, it tackles the problem first rather than technology first. Within information science, attention has been given in recent years to human–computer interaction, groupware, the semantic web, value sensitive design, iterative design processes and to the ways people generate, use and find information.

Information Science should not be confused with information theory, the mathematical study of the concept of information, or Library and information science a field related to libraries and related information fields.

1 Definitions of informatics
- 1.1 Regional differences
- 1.2 International terminology
2 Subdisciplines of Informatics
3 See also
4 External links

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Definitions of informatics

Some authors treat informatics as a synonym for information science. Because of the rapidly evolving, interdisciplinary nature of informatics, a precise meaning of the term "informatics" is presently difficult to pin down. Regional differences and international terminology complicate the problem. Some people note that much of what is called "Informatics" today was once called "Information Science" at least in fields such as Medical Informatics. However when Library scientists began to also use the phrase "Information Science" to refer to their work, the term informatics emerged in the United States as a response by Computer Scientists to distinguish their work from that of Library Science, and in Britain as a term for a science of information that studies natural, as well as artificial or engineered, information-processing systems.

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Regional differences

At the Indiana University School of Informatics, informatics is defined as "the art, science and human dimensions of information technology" and "the study, application, and social consequences of technology." These definitions are widely accepted in the United States.

A broader intepretation of informatics, as "the study of the structure, behaviour, and interactions of natural and artificial computational systems," was introduced by the University of Edinburgh School of Informatics in 1994 when it formed the grouping that is now the School of Informatics. This meaning is now increasingly used in the United Kingdom for example, at Sussex, City University, Bangor, Ulster, Bradford, and Newcastle. It encompasses the study of systems that represent, process, and communicate information, including all computational, cognitive and social aspects. The central notion is the transformation of information — whether by computation or communication, whether by organisms or artifacts. In this sense, informatics can be considered as encompassing computer science, cognitive science, artificial intelligence, information science and related fields.

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International terminology

The words informatique (French), Informatik (German), informatika (Slovak, Slovene, Czech, Hungarian), informatica (Italian, Dutch), informatyka (Polish) and informática (Spanish, Portuguese), among others, do not mean the same as the English definitions of informatics. Rather, these words refer to computer science in its broadest acceptation, and to any discipline which is focused on computers, including computer engineering, software engineering, and information technology.

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Subdisciplines of Informatics

Medical Informatics or Health Informatics – Informatics in Medicine and Healthcare; especially Biomedical Informatics and Clinical Informatics.
Bioinformatics – Informatics in biology,
- especially genomics, biomedical imagery, proteomics, systems biology, transcriptomics, regulation analysis
- Biodiversity Informatics – Informatics in taxonomy and systematics.
Cheminformatics
- e.g. QSAR, combinatorial chemistry, maximum common subgraph, SMILES, molecule mining
Community_informatics– the application of information and communication technologies in community setttings.
Discovery informatics – the creation of new information from existing information.
Ecoinformatics – Informatics in ecology and environmental science.
Hydroinformatics – Informatics as a tool in resolving water-related problems.
Legal informatics – Informatics in the legal field.
Neuroinformatics – Informatics in neuroscience. See The International Neuroinformatics Coordinating Facility (INCF) website, http://www.neuroinf.org/incf/ .
Social informatics – Informatics and social/organizational structure and change.
Veterinary informatics – Informatics in veterinary medicine.