  Data volumes from multiple sky surveys have grown from gigabytes into
terabytes during the past decade, and will grow from terabytes into tens (or
hundreds) of petabytes in the next decade. This exponential growth of new data
both enables and challenges effective astronomical research, requiring new
approaches. Thus far, astronomy has tended to address these challenges in an
informal and ad hoc manner, with the necessary special expertise being assigned
to e-Science or survey science. However, we see an even wider scope and
therefore promote a broader vision of this data-driven revolution in
astronomical research. For astronomy to effectively cope with and reap the
maximum scientific return from existing and future large sky surveys,
facilities, and data-producing projects, we need our own information science
specialists. We therefore recommend the formal creation, recognition, and
support of a major new discipline, which we call Astroinformatics.
Astroinformatics includes a set of naturally-related specialties including data
organization, data description, astronomical classification taxonomies,
astronomical concept ontologies, data mining, machine learning, visualization,
and astrostatistics. By virtue of its new stature, we propose that astronomy
now needs to integrate Astroinformatics as a formal sub-discipline within
agency funding plans, university departments, research programs, graduate
training, and undergraduate education. Now is the time for the recognition of
Astroinformatics as an essential methodology of astronomical research. The
future of astronomy depends on it.
