How Will Astronomy Archives Survive the Data Tsunami?
G. Bruce Berriman, Steven L. Groom · Queue · 2011
Astronomy is already awash with data: currently 1 PB of public data is electronically accessible, and this volume is growing at 0.5 PB per year. The availability of this data has already transformed research in astronomy, and the STScI now reports that more papers are published with archived data sets than with newly acquired data. This growth in data size and anticipated usage will accelerate in the coming few years as new projects such as the LSST, ALMA, and SKA move into operation. These new projects will use much larger arrays of telescopes and detectors or much higher data acquisition rates than are now used. Projections indicate that by 2020, more than 60 PB of archived data will be accessible to astronomers.