Energy.gov

In February, I wrote to you about ScienceCinema, a multimedia search engine developed by the Energy Department's Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI), in partnership with Microsoft.

Not too long ago, communicating scientific and technical information was limited to simple text documents and two-dimensional graphs and charts. With the birth of the Internet, the ability to communicate science more quickly in more ways to a larger, worldwide audience became a reality. ScienceCinema leverages state-of-the-art technology to multiply the “teaching” and communications potential of scientific videos and makes some of the Energy Department’s most exciting research more visible to researchers and the public.

ScienceCinema continues to grow, and I am pleased to announce that it will be adding audio and video materials from CERN , the European Organization for Nuclear Research. The inclusion of the CERN materials is a milestone in the longstanding scientific collaboration between the Department of Energy and CERN and will increase public access to CERN scientific multimedia collections.

Innovation inspires more innovation, and faster and more complex tools continue to be developed that allow researchers to communicate scientific and technical information in more interesting, exciting, complex, relevant, interactive and useful ways.

Continuous new discovery is required to meet national and worldwide needs for major advances to power our economy, promote energy security and protect our environment. It is essential to accelerate the diffusion of scientific and technical knowledge. OSTI continues to pioneer ways to facilitate a new era in sophistication and breadth of the tools to access and use scientific knowledge. ScienceCinema takes a big step into the future.

Brian A. Hitson is the Associate Director of Administration and Information Services at OSTI.