Data mining

From Science Europe Data Glossary

Definition: data mining is the computational process of discovering patterns in large data sets involving methods at the intersection of artificial intelligence, machine learning, statistics, and database systems.
Explanation: the overall goal of data mining is to extract information from a data set and to transform it into an understandable structure for further use. The goal is the extraction of patterns and knowledge from large amounts of data, not the extraction of data itself. It is frequently applied to any form of large-scale data or information processing.
Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_mining
See also: content mining; text mining.