Google correlate to identify the search queries for a given set of data

Google correlate opened a new chapter in the history of online search and launched a new Google Labs product called Google Correlate, which is aimed to find search trends, and attempts to apply them to real-world situations. A recent Google press release explained it as follows :

Google Correlate is an experimental new tool on Google Labs which enables you to find queries with a similar pattern to a target data series. The target can either be a real-world trend that you provide (e.g., a data set of event counts over time) or a query that you enter.

Google Correlate uses search activity data to find queries with a similar pattern to a target data series; the results of which can be viewed on the Google Correlate site (or downloaded as a CSV file).

“Google Correlate is like Google Trends in reverse,” says Google. “With Google Trends, you type in a query and get back a data series of activity (over time or in each US state). With Google Correlate, you enter a data series (the target) and get back a list of queries whose data series follows a similar pattern.”

Through Google Correlate, users can upload their own data sets. When you upload one, Google Correlate will compute the “Pearson Correlation Coefficient” between your time series and the frequency time series for every query in its database.

A tutorial sheet is available for the same with Google. Google says the data for Google Correlate is available from January 2003 to the present, with data being updated on a weekly basis.