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Informatics is the science of information, the practice of information processing, and the engineering of information systems. Information as a concept has a diversity of meanings from everyday usage to technical settings Information processing is the change (processing of Information in any manner detectable by an observer. The term information system (IS sometimes refers to a System of persons Data records and activities that process the data and Information in an organization Informatics studies the structure, algorithms, behavior, and interactions of natural and artificial systems that store, process, access and communicate information. It also develops its own conceptual and theoretical foundations and utilizes foundations developed in other fields. Since the advent of computers, individuals and organizations increasingly process information digitally. This has led to the study of informatics that has computational, cognitive and social aspects, including study of the social impact of information technologies.

Used as a compound, in conjunction with the name of a discipline, as in medical informatics, bioinformatics, etc. Health informatics or medical informatics is the intersection of Information science, Computer science, and Health care. Bioinformatics is the application of information technology to the field of molecular biology , it denotes the specialization of informatics to the management and processing of data, information and knowledge in the named discipline, and the incorporation of informatic concepts and theories to enrich the other discipline; it has a similar relationship to library science. Library science is an Interdisciplinary Science incorporating the Humanities, Law and Applied science to study topics related to


Contents

Etymology

In 1957 the German computer scientist Karl Steinbuch coined the word Informatik by publishing a paper called Informatik: Automatische Informationsverarbeitung ("Informatics: Automatic Information Processing"). Year 1957 ( MCMLVII) was a Common year starting on Tuesday (link displays the 1957 Gregorian calendar) Dr Karl W Steinbuch ( June 15, 1917 in Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt - June 4, 2005 in Ettlingen) was a German computer The English term Informatics is commonly misunderstood to be the same as computer science. Computer science (or computing science) is the study and the Science of the theoretical foundations of Information and Computation and their However, computer science is theoretically more oriented towards mathematics than informatics.

The French term informatique was coined in 1962 by Philippe Dreyfus[1] together with various translations—informatics (English), also proposed independently and simultaneously by Walter F.Bauer who co-founded the company named Informatics General, Inc. French ( français,) is a Romance language spoken around the world by 118 million people as a native language and by about 180 to 260 million people Year 1962 ( MCMLXII) was a Common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Philippe Dreyfus is an Informatics pioneer in France. After gaining his Bachelor Degree in Physics in 1950 from the the Physics and Chemistry , and informatica (Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch), referring to the application of computers to store and process information.

The term was coined as a combination of "information" and "automation" to describe the science of automatic information processing. The morphology—informat-ion + -ics—uses "the accepted form for names of sciences, as conics, linguistics, optics, or matters of practice, as economics, politics, tactics",[2] and so, linguistically, the meaning extends easily to encompass both the science of information and the practice of information processing.

History

This new term was adopted across Western Europe, and, except in English, developed a meaning roughly translated by the English ‘computer science’, or ‘computing science’. Mikhailov et al. Alexander Ivanovich Mikhailov, or A I Mikhailov ( December 6, 1905, Russian Empire - February 6, 1988, Moscow advocated the Russian term informatika (1966), and the English informatics (1967), as names for the theory of scientific information, and argued for a broader meaning, including study of the use of information technology in various communities (for example, scientific) and of the interaction of technology and human organizational structures.

Informatics is the discipline of science which investigates the structure and properties (not specific content) of scientific information, as well as the regularities of scientific information activity, its theory, history, methodology and organization. [3]

Usage has since modified this definition in three ways. First, the restriction to scientific information is removed, as in business informatics or legal informatics. Second, since most information is now digitally stored, computation is now central to informatics. Third, the representation, processing and communication of information are added as objects of investigation, since they have been recognized as fundamental to any scientific account of information. Taking information as the central focus of study, then distinguishes informatics—which includes study of biological and social mechanisms of information processing, from computer science—where digital computation plays a distinguished central role. Computer science (or computing science) is the study and the Science of the theoretical foundations of Information and Computation and their Similarly, in the study of representation and communication, informatics is indifferent to the substrate that carries information. For example, it encompasses the study of communication using gesture, speech and language, as well as digital communications and networking.

A broad interpretation of informatics, as "the study of the structure, algorithms, behaviour, and interactions of natural and artificial computational systems," was introduced by the University of Edinburgh in 1994 when it formed the grouping that is now its School of Informatics. The University of Edinburgh (Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann founded in 1582 is a renowned centre for teaching and research in Edinburgh, Scotland, UK. The School of Informatics is an academic unit of the University of Edinburgh, in Scotland, responsible for research teaching outreach and commercialisation This meaning is now (2006) increasingly used in the United Kingdom. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located [4] Informatics encompasses the study of systems that represent, process, and communicate information, including all computational, cognitive and social aspects. Knowledge representation is an area in Artificial intelligence that is concerned with how to formally "think" that is how to use a symbol system to represent Information processing is the change (processing of Information in any manner detectable by an observer. Communication is the process of conveying information from a sender to a receiver with the use of a medium in which the communicated information is understood the same way 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, and as extending the scope of computer science to encompass computation in natural, as well as engineered, computational systems. Computer science (or computing science) is the study and the Science of the theoretical foundations of Information and Computation and their Cognitive science may be broadly defined as the multidisciplinary study of mind and behavior Information science is an interdisciplinary science primarily concerned with the collection classification, manipulation storage retrieval and dissemination Arizona State University adopted this broader definition at the launch of its School of Computing and Informatics in September 2006. Arizona State University ( ASU) is the largest public Research university in the United States under a single administration with total student

The 2008 Research Assessment Exercise, of the UK Funding Councils, includes a new, Computer Science and Informatics, unit of assessment (UoA),[5] whose scope is described as follows:

The UoA includes the study of methods for acquiring, storing, processing, communicating and reasoning about information, and the role of interactivity in natural and artificial systems,through the implementation, organisation and use of computer hardware, software and other resources. The Research Assessment Exercise ( RAE) is an exercise undertaken approximately every 5 years on behalf of the four UK Higher education funding councils ( HEFCE The subjects are characterised by the rigorous application of analysis, experimentation and design.

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. Indiana University, founded in 1820, is a nine-campus University system in the state of Indiana. " It is also defined in Informatics I101, Introduction to Informatics as "the application of information technology to the arts, sciences, and professions. " These definitions are widely accepted in the United States, and differ from British usage in omitting the study of natural computation. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the

At the University of California, Irvine Department of Informatics, informatics is defined as "the interdisciplinary study of the design, application, use and impact of information technology. The University of California Irvine is a public Coeducational Research university situated in Irvine, California. The discipline of informatics is based on the recognition that the design of this technology is not solely a technical matter, but must focus on the relationship between the technology and its use in real-world settings. That is, informatics designs solutions in context, and takes into account the social, cultural and organizational settings in which computing and information technology will be used. "

In the English-speaking world the term informatics was first widely used in the compound, ‘medical informatics’, taken to include "the cognitive, information processing, and communication tasks of medical practice, education, and research, including information science and the technology to support these tasks". [6] Many such compounds are now in use; they can be viewed as different areas of applied informatics.

One of the most significant areas of applied informatics is that of organisational informatics. Organisational informatics is fundamentally interested in the application of information, information systems and ICT within organisations of various forms including private sector, public sector and voluntary sector organisations [7]. As such, organisational informatics can be seen to be sub-category of Social Informatics and a super-category of Business Informatics. Business informatics (BI is a discipline combining Information technology (IT – or Informatics – with management concepts

A practitioner of informatics may be called an informatician. Informatics is the science of Information, the practice of Information processing, and the engineering of Information systems.

Trademark

Informatics was registered as a trademark[8] in the United States by Informatics Inc. [9], which traded from 1966 to 1985. As of October, 2006, a search of the United States Patent and Trademark database reveals no live trademarks on the word "informatics" alone (although many combinations including that word do appear).

Contributing disciplines

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Dreyfus, Phillipe. Cognitive science may be broadly defined as the multidisciplinary study of mind and behavior Communication studies is an Academic field that deals with processes of communication commonly defined as the sharing of Symbols over distances in space and time This article describes complex system as a type of system For other meanings see Complex systems. Computer science (or computing science) is the study and the Science of the theoretical foundations of Information and Computation and their Didactics of computer science (didactics of informatics is a sub-field of Computer science ( Informatics) Information science is an interdisciplinary science primarily concerned with the collection classification, manipulation storage retrieval and dissemination Information theory is a branch of Applied mathematics and Electrical engineering involving the quantification of Information. Bioinformatics is the application of information technology to the field of molecular biology Biodiversity Informatics is the application of Informatics to recorded and yet-to-be discovered information specifically about Biodiversity, and the linking of this Biomedical informatics is the broad discipline concerned with the study and application of Computer science, Information science, Informatics, Cognitive Business informatics (BI is a discipline combining Information technology (IT – or Informatics – with management concepts Cheminformatics (also known as chemoinformatics and chemical informatics) is the use of computer and informational techniques applied to a range of problems Community informatics (CI also known as community networking, electronic community networking, community-based technologies or community technology Ecoinformatics is the science of information ( Informatics) in Ecology and Environmental science. Evolutionary informatics is a subfield of Informatics addressing the practice of information processing in and the engineering of information systems for the study of Geoinformatics is a Science which develops and uses Information science infrastructure to address the problems of Geosciences and related branches of Health informatics or medical informatics is the intersection of Information science, Computer science, and Health care. Information management ( IM) is the collection and management of Information from one or more sources and the distribution of that information to one or more audiences Neuroinformatics is a research field that encompasses the development of Neuroscience data and application of computational models and analytical tools Definition of Pharmacy Informatics Pharmacy informatics, also referred to as pharmacoinformatics, is the application of computers to the storage retrieval and Social informatics is the study of information and communication tools in Cultural, or Institutional contexts (Kling Rosenbaum & Sawyer 2005 Quantum information science concerns information science that depends on quantum effects in physics Nursing Informatics is a specialty of Health care informatics which deals with the support of Nursing by Information systems in delivery documentation L’informatique. Gestion, Paris, Jun 1962, pp. 240–41
  2. ^ Oxford English Dictionary 1989
  3. ^ Mikhailov, A. The Oxford English Dictionary ( OED) published by the Oxford University Press (OUP is a comprehensive Dictionary of the English I. , Chernyl, A. I. , and Gilyarevskii, R. S. (1966) "Informatika – novoe nazvanie teorii naučnoj informacii. " Naučno tehničeskaja informacija, 12, pp. 35–39.
  4. ^ For example, at Sussex, City University, Ulster, Bradford, Manchester and Newcastle
  5. ^ UoA 23 Computer Science and Informatics, Panel working methods
  6. ^ Greenes, R. A. and Shortliffe, E. H. (1990) "Medical Informatics: An emerging discipline with academic and institutional perspectives. " Journal of the American Medical Association, 263(8) pp. JAMA The Journal of the American Medical Association is an international peer-reviewed general Medical journal, published 48 times per year by the American 1114–20.
  7. ^ Beynon-Davies P. (2002). Information Systems: an introduction to informatics in Organisations. Palgrave, Basingstoke, UK. ISBN: 0-333-96390-3
  8. ^ Biographies: Informatics: An Early Software Company
  9. ^ Informatics

External links

Dictionary

informatics

-noun

  1. (computing) a branch of information science, and of computer science, that focuses on the study of information
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