Google Colaboratory, also known as Colab, is a free cloud-based platform provided by Google that allows users to write and execute Python code in a browser environment. It is built on Jupyter Notebooks, which are a popular open-source web application that combines live code, equations, visualizations, and narrative text.

Here are some reasons why Google Colab is particularly useful for data scientists:

1. Free GPU and TPU support: Colab provides free access to Graphical Processing Units (GPUs) and Tensor Processing Units (TPUs). This is especially advantageous for data scientists working with machine learning and deep learning models, as these hardware accelerators significantly speed up computations, especially for training complex models.

2. Cloud-based environment: Colab runs on Google's cloud servers, eliminating the need for users to set up and maintain their own computing infrastructure. This allows data scientists to work on projects from any device with an internet connection and collaborate with others in real-time.

3. Pre-installed libraries: Colab comes with many popular data science libraries pre-installed, such as Pandas, NumPy, TensorFlow, PyTorch, and Matplotlib. This makes it easy for data scientists to start working on their projects without having to worry about installing dependencies.

4. Integration with Google Drive: Colab seamlessly integrates with Google Drive, allowing users to easily import datasets and save their work. This integration simplifies the process of accessing and sharing data and notebooks.

5. Interactive environment: Being based on Jupyter Notebooks, Colab provides an interactive environment where users can mix code, visualizations, and explanatory text in the same document. This makes it a great tool for creating and sharing data analysis reports, tutorials, and presentations.

Educational purposes: Colab is widely used in educational settings due to its accessibility and ease of use. Students and educators can use it to teach and learn data science concepts, conduct experiments, and collaborate on projects.

Overall, Google Colaboratory offers a convenient and powerful platform for data scientists to perform various data analysis, machine learning, and deep learning tasks without the need for high-end hardware or significant setup efforts.