全球产生的数据量激增。它的数量和质量都是人类历史上无法比拟的。这仅仅是个开始：有人估计，数字宇宙（目前为3.2 ZB）将在短短的十年内增长到40 ZB。（兆字节约为10亿兆字节。）<br> <br>我们的土木和环境工程师正在努力通过新颖的数据收集技术（从无线传感器到无人驾驶飞机）利用所有这些数据的潜力。同时创建新的方式来处理，分析，可视化和使用这些信息。例如，我们的城市基础设施是世界上最复杂的系统之一。它将各种人造系统（交通，水，电力和电信等）与自然系统（海洋，空中，森林等）以及使我们的社会能够运转的社会
The amount of data generated around the world has exploded. It's available in volume and quality unmatched in human history. And this is just the beginning: the digital universe is growing at an exponential rate.<br><br>Our civil and environmental engineers are working to harness the potential of data with novel data collection techniques from wireless sensors to unmanned aerial vehicles while also creating new ways to process, analyze, visualize and use that information.<br><br>Take, for example, our urban infrastructure, which is among the most complex systems in the world. It mixes the various man-made systems (transportation, water, power and telecommunications) with natural systems (oceans, air, forests) as well as the social systems that enable our societies to function (everything from schools and the economy to the justice system and healthcare). Modeling these 'systems-of-systems will require managing data at an unprecedented scale.