The cyberinfrastructure and image information mining

A challenge for image information mining is the distributed nature of the resources necessary for accomplishing a specific query. The U.S. National Science Foundation has recognized the need for a cyberinfrastructure that connects hardware and software resources and experts around the globe to solve common problems. Such an infrastructure already exists for some Earth science disciplines. Grid computing and peer-to-peer computing are two approaches that may be used to build a cyberinfrastructure. In this paper we describe the unique features of each of them and compare them. The strengths and weaknesses of each are almost complementary and thus, consideration should be given toward using attributes of each in image information mining.