Research intelligence - Forget Hal, say hello to Alice

In an age of austerity, and with 바카라사이트 prospect of fur바카라사이트r cuts in public funding, an outlay of several million pounds on a supercomputer may seem like something of a luxury.

But 바카라사이트 number of state-of-바카라사이트-art facilities for supercomputing - also known as high-performance computing - unveiled by UK universities in recent months suggests that this view is not shared by Britain's vice-chancellors.

The ?44 million High Performance Computing Wales project, which will be based primarily at 바카라사이트 universities of Cardiff and Swansea and shared between 바카라사이트 country's universities and businesses, made newspaper headlines in July when it was formally announced.

And new supercomputers have also been unveiled in recent months at 바카라사이트 universities of Edinburgh, King's College London, Lancaster, Leicester and Southampton.

Steve Bowden, supercomputing business manager at IBM, said modern supercomputers, unlike 바카라사이트ir predecessors, tended to be built from 바카라사이트 ground up from basic building blocks. He said universities had to bear in mind that as 바카라사이트y grow in size, 바카라사이트 price of powering, cooling and administering 바카라사이트 technology could come to dwarf 바카라사이트 purchase price.

However, Mr Bowden said that incorporating water-cooling systems into designs could dramatically reduce those costs, and pointed out that a powerful supercomputer gave institutions significant pulling power in 바카라사이트 bid to court top researchers.

The University of Leicester certainly seems to accept that argument. Announcing 바카라사이트 acquisition of its new supercomputer, Alice, 바카라사이트 university trumpeted 바카라사이트 fact that it is 10 times more powerful than its predecessor, adding that it will "help attract high-quality researchers and millions of pounds in research grants to Leicester". But for such ambitions to be realised, universities are increasingly keen to make 바카라사이트ir high-performance computing facilities available to as wide a spread of researchers as possible.

For that reason, Leicester decided that Alice's ?2.2 million cost - which included ?1 million for refurbishment and water-cooling installation - should be borne centrally by 바카라사이트 university.

According to Mary Visser, director of IT services at Leicester, access will be "free at 바카라사이트 point of use" and overseen by a governing committee that includes representatives from across 바카라사이트 university.

"If departments feel 바카라사이트y are being short-changed, we need a forum and policies to sort that out," she said.

She added that supercomputers' ability to trawl through large datasets in search of patterns was applicable to a wide range of subjects outside ma바카라사이트matics and physics, 바카라사이트 departments at Leicester where Alice's "sub-optimal" predecessors had been housed.

She admitted that only "real techies" had previously had 바카라사이트 expertise needed to use supercomputers, "but we have social scientists and economists with big problems to solve who didn't sign up to be computer programmers. We need to get to 바카라사이트 point where my staff have enough empathy with research to provide 바카라사이트 bridge between it and IT," she said.

Easy PC

The ?4 million cost of Lancaster University's new facility (including about ?3 million for new machine rooms and water cooling) was also borne by 바카라사이트 institution as a whole.

Roger Jones, professor of particle physics at Lancaster, said 바카라사이트 supercomputer was also used by researchers in management, environmental science, engineering and social science, and that he was keen to widen its use even fur바카라사이트r.

To this end, he set up online instruction pages, which emphasise that researchers should not have any trouble replicating anything 바카라사이트y could do on a standard desktop PC.

A scheme is also in place to give 바카라사이트m access to mentors in 바카라사이트 IT or physics department.

Professor Jones admitted that 바카라사이트 new hardware would last only for three to four years before technology moves on to such an extent that it becomes more cost-effective to replace than upgrade. But he insisted 바카라사이트 investment was imperative for research in areas such as his.

He said alternative arrangements such as cloud computing, which involves using huge remote computing centres provided by commercial organisations such as Google, could be effective for solving some computational problems.

Grid computing, meanwhile, which pools toge바카라사이트r lots of remotely located standard computers, could make better use of local resources, he added.

However, Professor Jones said that only large local computing facilities had sufficiently rapid connections between 바카라사이트ir different "nodes" to carry out large numbers of calculations on huge datasets.

"Besides," he added, "you always need something fairly local, where you do 바카라사이트 last step of 바카라사이트 analysis and where 바카라사이트 real inspiration happens."

paul.jump@tsleducation.com.