HELIO: Discovery and Analysis of Data in Heliophysics

Heliophysics is the study of highly energetic events that originate on the sun and propogate through the solar system. Such events can cause critical and possibly fatal disruption of the electromagnetic systems on spacecraft and on ground based structures such as electric power grids, so there is a clear need to understand the events in their totality as they propogate through space and time. This poses a fascinating eScience challenge since the data is gathered by many observatories and communities that have hitherto not needed to work together. We describe how we are developing an eScience infrastructure to make the discovery and analysis of such complex events possible for the communities of heliophysics. The new systematic and data-centric science which will develop from this will be a child of both the space and information ages.