Rice joins ‘Extreme
Science’ computing platform
Tapia leads expansion
of supercomputer resources to researchers, students

FROM RICE NEWS STAFF
REPORTS

Rice University is one of a handful of educational institutions chosen
to participate in a new National Science Foundation (NSF) initiative to expand
the availability of high-performance computing (HPC) to a vast number of
researchers around the country.

	RICHARD TAPIA

Richard Tapia, University Professor and the Maxfield-Oshman Professor
in Engineering, will lead the Rice effort and will administer the nearly $1 million,
five-year award to help engage students from across the country with the Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment (XSEDE).

Researchers in a wide range of fields — energy, climate and health care,
for starters — will be able to take advantage of the advanced opportunities
for collaboration offered by XSEDE.

XSEDE builds upon the now-completed TeraGrid project, which integrated
supercomputer resources at 11 partner sites. The $121-million XSEDE will
initially incorporate 16 supercomputers across the country, with digital
resources and services to be expanded throughout the lifetime of the project.

Project leader John Towns of the University of Illinois’ National
Center for Supercomputing Applications said XSEDE will offer access to data,
instruments and collaboration tools as well as computing horsepower.

“These things are not necessarily HPC resources,” he said.
“The HPC resources are still critical, in general, for the success of a
lot of the research work. But the focus of the project is now on user and
researcher productivity.”

Towns called the project “much more than just the same old
resources that TeraGrid offered. XSEDE will take the next step by lowering
technological barriers to access and use.”

Through the grant, Tapia will create a national network of students,
faculty mentors and XSEDE researchers to raise awareness about the initiative and
identify underrepresented faculty and students who would benefit from the
technical assistance offered by XSEDE. 

“I look forward to this work,” Tapia said. “It builds on
many years that we have worked with the high-performance computing community to
bring some of the most exciting science to a broader audience.”

Seventeen institutions, including the University of Texas at Austin,
are part of XSEDE.