InformationWeek’s Aaron Ricadela looks at the “seismic shift” occurring in the world of high-end computing, pointing to the retirement of the PACI program and the National Science Foundation’s new focus on “shared cyberinfrastructure.” The article examines the unique roles each HPC center will play, with San Diego focusing on data, NCSA focusing on innovative systems, and Pittsburgh supplying cycles.

In a sidebar interview, Ricadela talks to Peter Freeman, leader of NSF’s Computer and Information Science and Engineering Directorate. Freeman describes the shift taking place at NSF and how shared cyberinfrastructure will benefit users. “When people talk about PACI, they’re talking about the way high–performance computing used to be provided to the research community, versus the way we think it will be provided five to 10 years down the road,” Freeman explains. “We’re right in the middle of that kind of transformation.”

A second sidebar looks at NCSA’s plans for the future under new director Thom Dunning, including the development of “cyberenvironments” and workflow tools to assist researchers, an expansion of the center’s Private Sector Program, and the launch of the Innovative Systems Lab to push the computing envelope.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 14th, 2005 at 4:20 pm and is filed under Federally funded institutions, Policy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.