MidPlus: A Centre of Excellence for Computational Science, Engineering and Mathematics
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Warwick
Department Name: Centre for Scientific Computing
Abstract
We propose to establish a Centre of Excellence for Computational Science, Engineering and Mathematics (MidPlus) that serves the M1/M6 corridor from London to the Midlands, initially based on four leading universities with outstanding credentials for cross-institutional collaboration, industrial partnership, and computational research: Warwick, Birmingham, Nottingham and Queen Mary. We focus on this region because geographical proximity greatly facilitates outreach and ongoing interactions with industrial partners-especially for SMEs. MidPlus is well located to serve many organisations within the UK's automotive, aerospace, biomedical, materials and creative industries. We will extend this partnership to such companies, and other Universities, as MidPlus develops.
This Centre of Excellence will be established with an initial investment in e-Infrastructure of £3M (£1.6M from this EPSRC call and £1.4M from the partner Universities) that will provide:
* High performance Computing (HPC) through a capability cluster (Warwick; 2700 cores, infiniBand, some GPU and large-memory SMP nodes) to be combined with Warwick's existing cluster (commissioned 05/2011) to create a 6000 core cluster and so maximise scope for large massively parallel jobs; and a high throughput cluster (QMUL, 2900 cores) to facilitate projects that require multiple runs to span large parameter spaces.
* Data storage and archive facilities (mirrored at Birmingham and Nottingham for data integrity) to enable mid- and long-term storage of research data (initially ~1 PB capacity), and the management structures to enable metadata-based search and retrieval with secure implementation of a range of user-specified levels of privacy.
In the longer term we will: extend the capacity of the data store; develop an automated data-aging protocol to migrate data, successively, to appropriate longer-term storage technologies; extend the range of tier-2 HPC architecture we support; and develop greater integration of, and faster regional network connections between, the data and compute hardware.
Our collective research expertise and mastery of managing and using e-Infrastructure is as crucial to the success of MidPlus as is the equipment we will install. We will therefore build an intellectual superstructure on top of the e-Infrastructure that will:
* actively promote collaborations that cross disciplinary and institutional boundaries;
* provide a coordinated systems and administrative support team to enable industries with existing expertise to use these facilities-either to deal with the peaks in their internal demand for computer facilities or as an alternative to establishing their own;
* provide an expertise-base to nurture new industrial use of this e-Infrastructure;
* create a strategic framework within which to sustain and develop the regional e-Infrastructure.
This intellectual superstructure will enable MidPlus to offer services that add much more value than could be obtained from the bare e-Infrastructure or, indeed, from industrial cloud computing services.
This Centre of Excellence will be established with an initial investment in e-Infrastructure of £3M (£1.6M from this EPSRC call and £1.4M from the partner Universities) that will provide:
* High performance Computing (HPC) through a capability cluster (Warwick; 2700 cores, infiniBand, some GPU and large-memory SMP nodes) to be combined with Warwick's existing cluster (commissioned 05/2011) to create a 6000 core cluster and so maximise scope for large massively parallel jobs; and a high throughput cluster (QMUL, 2900 cores) to facilitate projects that require multiple runs to span large parameter spaces.
* Data storage and archive facilities (mirrored at Birmingham and Nottingham for data integrity) to enable mid- and long-term storage of research data (initially ~1 PB capacity), and the management structures to enable metadata-based search and retrieval with secure implementation of a range of user-specified levels of privacy.
In the longer term we will: extend the capacity of the data store; develop an automated data-aging protocol to migrate data, successively, to appropriate longer-term storage technologies; extend the range of tier-2 HPC architecture we support; and develop greater integration of, and faster regional network connections between, the data and compute hardware.
Our collective research expertise and mastery of managing and using e-Infrastructure is as crucial to the success of MidPlus as is the equipment we will install. We will therefore build an intellectual superstructure on top of the e-Infrastructure that will:
* actively promote collaborations that cross disciplinary and institutional boundaries;
* provide a coordinated systems and administrative support team to enable industries with existing expertise to use these facilities-either to deal with the peaks in their internal demand for computer facilities or as an alternative to establishing their own;
* provide an expertise-base to nurture new industrial use of this e-Infrastructure;
* create a strategic framework within which to sustain and develop the regional e-Infrastructure.
This intellectual superstructure will enable MidPlus to offer services that add much more value than could be obtained from the bare e-Infrastructure or, indeed, from industrial cloud computing services.
Planned Impact
The impact of the MidPlus project could be truly far-reaching, especially for small to medium sized enterprises within the our region. In MidPlus, we are proposing to establish a high-quality tier-2 e-infrastructure, with both high performance computing (HPC) and data facilities, that will serve all enterprises within the MidPlus region; this region is based around the M1/M6 corridor from London to the Midlands, and contains commercial strength in the UK's automotive, aerospace, biomedical, materials and creative industries. Most importantly, we plan to enhance the value of the facility-provision considerably by building a powerful consultancy and training framework around the strategic collaboration that is at the heart of MidPlus. This will enable commercial and industrial enterprises to recognise how they can benefit from state-of-the-art e-Infrastructure, and then develop the consultancies and internal skill-sets to reap maximum commercial advantage from using it.
To ensure we deliver full impact in the region, we will undertake a number of activities to ensure effective engagement with stakeholders in the region. These will include workshops, designed either to communicate our research expertise across disciplinary and cultural boundaries, or to brainstorm on current problems that are challenging some of the enterprises. We will also appoint business engagement officers to identify, and then nurture potential partnerships with SMEs and established industries. Activity in this area will be considerably enhanced by developing commercial partnerships with value-added companies such as OCF plc, where this is appropriate.
We will also work closely with a number of successful industry-linkage programmes our Universities are already involved in, notably the Warwick Manufacturing Group, the Horizon Digital Economy research hub and ImpactQM. These will be excellent vehicles for raising awareness of MidPlus as a precursor to identifying and evaluating benefits and then moving to engagement.
To ensure we deliver full impact in the region, we will undertake a number of activities to ensure effective engagement with stakeholders in the region. These will include workshops, designed either to communicate our research expertise across disciplinary and cultural boundaries, or to brainstorm on current problems that are challenging some of the enterprises. We will also appoint business engagement officers to identify, and then nurture potential partnerships with SMEs and established industries. Activity in this area will be considerably enhanced by developing commercial partnerships with value-added companies such as OCF plc, where this is appropriate.
We will also work closely with a number of successful industry-linkage programmes our Universities are already involved in, notably the Warwick Manufacturing Group, the Horizon Digital Economy research hub and ImpactQM. These will be excellent vehicles for raising awareness of MidPlus as a precursor to identifying and evaluating benefits and then moving to engagement.
Organisations
Publications
Jäger M
(2018)
First principles global optimization of metal clusters and nanoalloys
in Advances in Physics: X
Kistler JO
(2015)
Development and pyrosequencing analysis of an in-vitro oral biofilm model.
in BMC microbiology
Kistler JO
(2015)
The oral microbiome in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-positive individuals.
in Journal of medical microbiology
Knell RJ
(2017)
Selective harvest focused on sexual signal traits can lead to extinction under directional environmental change.
in Proceedings. Biological sciences
Landy R
(2018)
What cervical screening is appropriate for women who have been vaccinated against high risk HPV? A simulation study.
in International journal of cancer
Li L
(2020)
Negative thermal expansion of cubic silicon dicarbodiimide, Si(NCN)2, studied by ab initio lattice dynamics.
in Journal of physics. Condensed matter : an Institute of Physics journal
Li L
(2023)
The contribution of phonons to the thermal expansion of some simple cubic hexaboride structures: SmB 6 , CaB 6 , SrB 6 and BaB 6
in Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics
Lifanov Y
(2016)
Nucleation barrier reconstruction via the seeding method in a lattice model with competing nucleation pathways.
in The Journal of chemical physics
Lin T
(2021)
A high-throughput method to characterize membrane viscosity of flowing microcapsules
in Physics of Fluids
Lin T
(2022)
Characterising Mechanical Properties of Flowing Microcapsules Using a Deep Convolutional Neural Network
in Advances in Applied Mathematics and Mechanics
Lique F
(2018)
Collisional excitation of interstellar PO(X 2 ?) by He: new ab initio potential energy surfaces and scattering calculations
in Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics
Liu J
(2019)
Thermal Disorder and Bond Anharmonicity in Cesium Lead Iodide Studied by Neutron Total Scattering and the Reverse Monte Carlo Method
in The Journal of Physical Chemistry C
Lowe R
(2015)
The senescent methylome and its relationship with cancer, ageing and germline genetic variation in humans.
in Genome biology
Lu R
(2023)
Transient deformation of a viscoelastic capsule in a cross-slot microchannel: effects of inertia and membrane viscosity
in Journal of Fluid Mechanics
Lu R
(2021)
Path selection of a train of spherical capsules in a branched microchannel
in Journal of Fluid Mechanics
Lukasik M
(2019)
Gaussian Processes for Rumour Stance Classification in Social Media
in ACM Transactions on Information Systems
Lyra W
(2017)
Orbital Advection with Magnetohydrodynamics and Vector Potential
in The Astronomical Journal
Ma L
(2015)
Angiosperms Are Unique among Land Plant Lineages in the Occurrence of Key Genes in the RNA-Directed DNA Methylation (RdDM) Pathway.
in Genome biology and evolution
Marinakis S
(2015)
Collisional excitation of CH(X²?) by He: new ab initio potential energy surfaces and scattering calculations.
in Physical chemistry chemical physics : PCCP
Marsden A
(2015)
Effect of oxygen and nitrogen functionalization on the physical and electronic structure of graphene
in Nano Research
Martinez P
(2016)
Dynamic clonal equilibrium and predetermined cancer risk in Barrett's oesophagus.
in Nature communications
Martinez P
(2017)
Quantification of within-sample genetic heterogeneity from SNP-array data.
in Scientific reports
McNally C
(2017)
Low mass planet migration in magnetically torqued dead zones - I. Static migration torque
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
McNally C
(2018)
Low mass planet migration in Hall-affected disks
in Journal of Physics: Conference Series
Mondragon R
(2017)
Multilink Communities of Multiplex Networks
Mondragon RJ
(2018)
Multilink communities of multiplex networks.
in PloS one
Mulholland S
(2016)
Docking and molecular dynamics simulations of the ternary complex nisin2:lipid II.
in Scientific reports
Mutter M
(2017)
The role of disc self-gravity in circumbinary planet systems - II. Planet evolution
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Mutter M
(2017)
The role of disc self-gravity in circumbinary planet systems - I. Disc structure and evolution
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Nicosia V
(2014)
Nonlinear growth and condensation in multiplex networks.
in Physical review. E, Statistical, nonlinear, and soft matter physics
Nicosia V
(2015)
Measuring and modeling correlations in multiplex networks.
in Physical review. E, Statistical, nonlinear, and soft matter physics
Núñez C
(2016)
Silicene-based spin-filter device: impact of random vacancies
in 2D Materials
Oluwunmi P
(2015)
Molecular dynamics screening for new kinetic inhibitors of methane hydrate
in Canadian Journal of Chemistry
Orsi M
(2014)
Direct Mixing of Atomistic Solutes and Coarse-Grained Water.
in Journal of chemical theory and computation
Oswald J
(2017)
Manifestation of many-body interactions in the integer quantum Hall effect regime
in Physical Review B
Padda H
(2016)
Intra-pulse transition between ion acceleration mechanisms in intense laser-foil interactions
in Physics of Plasmas
Penfold CA
(2015)
Inferring orthologous gene regulatory networks using interspecies data fusion.
in Bioinformatics (Oxford, England)
Pracana R
(2017)
Fire ant social chromosomes: Differences in number, sequence and expression of odorant binding proteins.
in Evolution letters
Pracana R
(2017)
The fire ant social chromosome supergene variant Sb shows low diversity but high divergence from SB.
in Molecular ecology
Prakash M
(2017)
Anisotropic diffusion of water molecules in hydroxyapatite nanopores
in Physics and Chemistry of Minerals
Pöppler A
(2017)
Single-crystal X-ray diffraction and NMR crystallography of a 1:1 cocrystal of dithianon and pyrimethanil
in Acta Crystallographica Section C Structural Chemistry
Rees G
(2021)
Mapping of N-C Bond Formation from a Series of Crystalline Peri-Substituted Naphthalenes by Charge Density and Solid-State NMR Methodologies
in Angewandte Chemie
Rees GJ
(2020)
Measuring multiple 17O-13C J-couplings in naphthalaldehydic acid: a combined solid state NMR and density functional theory approach.
in Physical chemistry chemical physics : PCCP
Rees GJ
(2021)
Mapping of N-C Bond Formation from a Series of Crystalline Peri-Substituted Naphthalenes by Charge Density and Solid-State NMR Methodologies.
in Angewandte Chemie (International ed. in English)
Römer RA
(2016)
The flexibility and dynamics of protein disulfide isomerase.
in Proteins
Description | This grant was to establish a regional high-end e-Infrastructure centre (MidPlus), serving the Universities of Birmingham, Warwick, Nottingham and QMUL, and looking to develop links with other Universities and industry in the London/Midlands region. We have established a range of facilities, including High Performance and High Throughput Clusters and a (mirrored) PB data store that has now been fully used and servicing this community for three years. |
Exploitation Route | This grant provided a service, and this service is being used by many researchers in Universities and industry to tackle their specific R&D problems. |
Sectors | Aerospace, Defence and Marine,Agriculture, Food and Drink,Chemicals,Creative Economy,Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software),Education,Energy,Environment,Healthcare,Manufacturing, including Industrial Biotechology,Pharmaceuticals and Medical Biotechnology |
URL | http://www.midplus.ac.uk |
Description | This service has prompted concerted effort between the four member Universities to develop ways to interact cooperatively with Industry in the area of Scientific Computing and e-Infrastructure exploitation. This is an ongoing development. the establishment of the Centre has also led to the formation of a network with four other EPSRC-funded Regional Centres, associated with EPSRC grant EP/M02010X/1 |
First Year Of Impact | 2011 |
Sector | Aerospace, Defence and Marine,Agriculture, Food and Drink,Chemicals,Creative Economy,Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software),Education,Energy,Environment,Healthcare,Pharmaceuticals and Medical Biotechnology |
Impact Types | Societal,Economic |