Manycore Research Innovation and Opportunities Network (MaRIONet)
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Glasgow
Department Name: School of Computing Science
Abstract
The transition to manycore systems is arguably the greatest challenge
facing the ICT industry, Computational Science, and Computing Science
research. The challenge is globally recognised, and is an EPSRC ICT priority:
Manycore Architectures in Distributed and Embedded Systems (MACDES).
The proposed network will identify and bring together a critical mass
of UK manycore researchers.
The manycore revolution is fundamentally changing multiple levels of
the computation execution stack: from processor architecture, through
systems software, to applications. The UK has world leading
researchers and industrialists working on specific technologies at
each level, but currently researchers and engineers do not collaborate
adequately on the complex manycore challenges. Furthermore,
meaningful industry engagement is limited, despite the large number of
UK-based industrial research labs with strategic interest in manycore
systems.
We will foster effective communication between academic and industrial
research teams both at different levels in the execution stack
(e.g. compiler developers targeting an emergent architecture), and
within each level (e.g. program analysis applied to improve memory
access latency in the systems layer). The teams will benefit by being
able to identify and exploit synergies and opportunities for
cross-pollination.
We will establish well defined, highly available channels for
communication and low-overhead mechanisms for collaboration. Given
that many world-class UK researchers are isolated in relatively small
departments and research groups, the network will enable national
sharing of ideas, information and infrastructure. Community support
and resource pooling will enable UK researchers to achieve greater
academic impact globally, competing effectively with larger,
well-resourced groups in the USA (e.g. Aspire Lab at Berkeley), China
(e.g. State Key Lab of Computer System and Architecture, Chinese
Academy of Sciences), and elsewhere.
Both architectural innovation and systems software development are
massive investments, often involving person-decades of
effort. MaRIONet will enable sharing of expertise and infrastructure
to lower the barrier to entry for UK systems researchers working in
this area. Industrial network partners will gain exposure to
cutting-edge research, and ideas to address current problems. Academic
partners gain real-world use cases and grand challenges.
At least three of the UK Policy Exchange `Eight great technologies'
are directly enabled by the increased scale and speed of future manycore
systems and software, namely:
* Big Data revolution: enabled by manycore systems for
energy-efficient collection, analysis and storage of big data.
* Robotics and autonomous systems: enabled by manycore
systems for artificial intelligence, planning, image recognition,
humanoid motion control.
* Synthetic biology: enabled by manycore processing of biological
data, in-silico simulation of bio-mechanisms.
Hence we anticipate that future UK economic growth and societal well-being
will be strongly influenced by manycore technology, which is the focus of
our research network.
facing the ICT industry, Computational Science, and Computing Science
research. The challenge is globally recognised, and is an EPSRC ICT priority:
Manycore Architectures in Distributed and Embedded Systems (MACDES).
The proposed network will identify and bring together a critical mass
of UK manycore researchers.
The manycore revolution is fundamentally changing multiple levels of
the computation execution stack: from processor architecture, through
systems software, to applications. The UK has world leading
researchers and industrialists working on specific technologies at
each level, but currently researchers and engineers do not collaborate
adequately on the complex manycore challenges. Furthermore,
meaningful industry engagement is limited, despite the large number of
UK-based industrial research labs with strategic interest in manycore
systems.
We will foster effective communication between academic and industrial
research teams both at different levels in the execution stack
(e.g. compiler developers targeting an emergent architecture), and
within each level (e.g. program analysis applied to improve memory
access latency in the systems layer). The teams will benefit by being
able to identify and exploit synergies and opportunities for
cross-pollination.
We will establish well defined, highly available channels for
communication and low-overhead mechanisms for collaboration. Given
that many world-class UK researchers are isolated in relatively small
departments and research groups, the network will enable national
sharing of ideas, information and infrastructure. Community support
and resource pooling will enable UK researchers to achieve greater
academic impact globally, competing effectively with larger,
well-resourced groups in the USA (e.g. Aspire Lab at Berkeley), China
(e.g. State Key Lab of Computer System and Architecture, Chinese
Academy of Sciences), and elsewhere.
Both architectural innovation and systems software development are
massive investments, often involving person-decades of
effort. MaRIONet will enable sharing of expertise and infrastructure
to lower the barrier to entry for UK systems researchers working in
this area. Industrial network partners will gain exposure to
cutting-edge research, and ideas to address current problems. Academic
partners gain real-world use cases and grand challenges.
At least three of the UK Policy Exchange `Eight great technologies'
are directly enabled by the increased scale and speed of future manycore
systems and software, namely:
* Big Data revolution: enabled by manycore systems for
energy-efficient collection, analysis and storage of big data.
* Robotics and autonomous systems: enabled by manycore
systems for artificial intelligence, planning, image recognition,
humanoid motion control.
* Synthetic biology: enabled by manycore processing of biological
data, in-silico simulation of bio-mechanisms.
Hence we anticipate that future UK economic growth and societal well-being
will be strongly influenced by manycore technology, which is the focus of
our research network.
Planned Impact
We envisage impact primarily in the areas of Knowledge, People and
Economy. We denote RCUK impact activities as: Application and
exploitation(APP), Communication & engagement (COMM), Collaboration &
co-production(COLL) and Capacity & involvement(CAP).
KNOWLEDGE
MaRIONet enhances the capability of the fragmented UK manycore research
community by creating a critical mass, to deliver better representation
of UK-based research in leading international conferences, (e.g. PLDI,
ASPLOS), journals (e.g. IEEE TOCS, ACM TOPLAS), and events
(e.g. HiPEAC, UK-MAC). (COMM,CAP)
Direct contributions to knowledge include open access reports and
lecture notes. A key contribution is the roadmap that should inform
future funding priorities. (COMM,CAP)
The impact of new technologies developed within the network will be
enhanced by ongoing engagement with industrial network partners. We
will foster collaborations, including academic/industrial
collaborations, via regular network meetings, industrial fora like
EdLambda, and by Innovate UK KTN events. (APP,CAP)
Open access to documents and software will facilitate
dissemination. Similarly open access to software and our infrastructure
sharing scheme will encourage technology adoption and multi-technology
evaluation by making cross-site experimentation easier. (APP,COLL)
PEOPLE
We will facilitate the development of new skills for current
practitioners, and the training of new practitioners as part of the UK
people pipeline. Moreover we seek to engage the wider public with social
media, and school children via classroom materials. (CAP)
Postgraduate students and early career researchers will enhance both
discipline-specific competence and transferable skills by attending
themed meetings, annual workshops and the Summer School. The large
postgraduate and early career community identified by the network will
be a key part of a nationwide virtual centre of excellence for
manycore. An early career mentoring champion on the steering committee
will provide informal advice and career guidance at annual
workshops. Industrial partners will provide placements/internships for
early career researchers. (CAP, COLL)
Our social media strategy exploits channels like twitter and Youtube to
present network activities to a wider audience, e.g. three-minute videos
summarising new research. We will raise the exposure and clarify the
motivation of our publicly-funded research. (COMM)
Our schools outreach strategy will exploit existing strong links with
the Computing At School grassroots ICT teachers organization. The PI
will design manycore classroom activity packs to support computational
thinking. The packs will be developed by interns at Glasgow, then
distributed via Computing At School, and using online media
channels. (CAP, COMM)
ECONOMY
Effectively exploiting manycore architectures is arguably the greatest
challenge facing the UK ICT sector, which directly employs 1m people and
is worth GBP 58 billion annually. MaRIONet seeks to strengthen the
manycore capabilities of the sector and secure them as a core competency
for UK ICT.
We will exploit strong industrial links of the initial network partners,
and target strong growth in industrial partners during the project.
Relevant technical challenges from industrial partners at network
meetings will foster academic/industrial collaborative projects. These
may start as hackathons or internships, and then transition into more
substantial collaborations. Some may leverage Knowledge Transfer Account
(KTA), or other, funding. (COLL, CAP)
We will encourage industrial exploitation and application of academic
research. Individual members have access to institutional help, e.g.
Easy Access IP. A knowledge transfer champion on the steering committee
will provide expert consultancy to academic and industrial network
partners about best practice for research exploitation. (COLL, CAP)
Economy. We denote RCUK impact activities as: Application and
exploitation(APP), Communication & engagement (COMM), Collaboration &
co-production(COLL) and Capacity & involvement(CAP).
KNOWLEDGE
MaRIONet enhances the capability of the fragmented UK manycore research
community by creating a critical mass, to deliver better representation
of UK-based research in leading international conferences, (e.g. PLDI,
ASPLOS), journals (e.g. IEEE TOCS, ACM TOPLAS), and events
(e.g. HiPEAC, UK-MAC). (COMM,CAP)
Direct contributions to knowledge include open access reports and
lecture notes. A key contribution is the roadmap that should inform
future funding priorities. (COMM,CAP)
The impact of new technologies developed within the network will be
enhanced by ongoing engagement with industrial network partners. We
will foster collaborations, including academic/industrial
collaborations, via regular network meetings, industrial fora like
EdLambda, and by Innovate UK KTN events. (APP,CAP)
Open access to documents and software will facilitate
dissemination. Similarly open access to software and our infrastructure
sharing scheme will encourage technology adoption and multi-technology
evaluation by making cross-site experimentation easier. (APP,COLL)
PEOPLE
We will facilitate the development of new skills for current
practitioners, and the training of new practitioners as part of the UK
people pipeline. Moreover we seek to engage the wider public with social
media, and school children via classroom materials. (CAP)
Postgraduate students and early career researchers will enhance both
discipline-specific competence and transferable skills by attending
themed meetings, annual workshops and the Summer School. The large
postgraduate and early career community identified by the network will
be a key part of a nationwide virtual centre of excellence for
manycore. An early career mentoring champion on the steering committee
will provide informal advice and career guidance at annual
workshops. Industrial partners will provide placements/internships for
early career researchers. (CAP, COLL)
Our social media strategy exploits channels like twitter and Youtube to
present network activities to a wider audience, e.g. three-minute videos
summarising new research. We will raise the exposure and clarify the
motivation of our publicly-funded research. (COMM)
Our schools outreach strategy will exploit existing strong links with
the Computing At School grassroots ICT teachers organization. The PI
will design manycore classroom activity packs to support computational
thinking. The packs will be developed by interns at Glasgow, then
distributed via Computing At School, and using online media
channels. (CAP, COMM)
ECONOMY
Effectively exploiting manycore architectures is arguably the greatest
challenge facing the UK ICT sector, which directly employs 1m people and
is worth GBP 58 billion annually. MaRIONet seeks to strengthen the
manycore capabilities of the sector and secure them as a core competency
for UK ICT.
We will exploit strong industrial links of the initial network partners,
and target strong growth in industrial partners during the project.
Relevant technical challenges from industrial partners at network
meetings will foster academic/industrial collaborative projects. These
may start as hackathons or internships, and then transition into more
substantial collaborations. Some may leverage Knowledge Transfer Account
(KTA), or other, funding. (COLL, CAP)
We will encourage industrial exploitation and application of academic
research. Individual members have access to institutional help, e.g.
Easy Access IP. A knowledge transfer champion on the steering committee
will provide expert consultancy to academic and industrial network
partners about best practice for research exploitation. (COLL, CAP)
Organisations
- University of Glasgow (Lead Research Organisation)
- European Network of Excellence in High Performance and Embedded Architecture and Compilation (Collaboration)
- Codeplay (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH (Project Partner)
- Microsoft Research (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- Imagination Technologies (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- Bayncore Limited (Project Partner)
- Maxeler Technologies (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- Red Hat (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
People |
ORCID iD |
Jeremy Singer (Principal Investigator) | |
Phil Trinder (Co-Investigator) |
Publications
Archibald B
(2018)
Replicable parallel branch and bound search
in Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing
Archibald B
(2017)
Towards Generic Scalable Parallel Combinatorial Search
Lubbers M
(2023)
Could Tierless Languages Reduce IoT Development Grief?
in ACM Transactions on Internet of Things
MacGregor R
(2022)
Generic Exact Combinatorial Search at HPC Scale
in International Journal of Parallel Programming
MacGregor R
(2021)
Improving GHC Haskell NUMA profiling
Vanderbauwhede Wim
(2019)
Operating Systems Foundations with Linux on the Raspberry Pi: Textbook
Varghese B
(2019)
Cloud Futurology
in Computer
Description | The UK computer systems research is strong and active. This network has sought to bring together disparate elements of this community - e.g. from high-performance computing, computer architecture, runtime software systems, and applications. We have succeeded in some measure, through a programme of engagement events and publicity. However the work should continue for the next few years, even after funding completes. |
Exploitation Route | There is a critical mass of researchers from academic and industrial contexts in the area of manycore systems, software and applications. This network has identified the body of researchers and sought to bring them together into a unified community. This will be helpful for: - future cross-disciplinary research initiatives - future targeted funding calls - disseminating information about e.g. workshops / conferences - industry looking to 'find' academic expertise in the area |
Sectors | Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software) Education |
URL | https://manycore.org.uk/ |
Description | Increasing engagement between the UK academic and industrial research communities, in the manycore systems and software domains. This is evidenced by joint workshops, successful PhD summer schools, and collaborative document writing. At present, there are around 200 members of the UK manycore network, drawn from universities, industrial research labs, and more general tech sector employers. In Aug 2022, the 28th International European Conference on Parallel and Distributed Computing will be convened in Glasgow, Scotland - this is a direct result of engagement with the Manycore network. |
First Year Of Impact | 2018 |
Sector | Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software),Education,Electronics,Environment |
Impact Types | Economic |
Title | Replicable Parallel Branch and Bound Search |
Description | |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2017 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Description | HiPEAC Steering Committee membership |
Organisation | European Network of Excellence in High Performance and Embedded Architecture and Compilation |
Sector | Learned Society |
PI Contribution | Input to the HiPEAC Vision roadmap document ( https://www.hipeac.net/vision/#/ ) which explores the future of computing systems. The document is presented to EU stakeholders annually. |
Collaborator Contribution | Participation in network events, hosting events. |
Impact | HiPEAC vision document https://www.hipeac.net/vision/#/ |
Start Year | 2018 |
Description | Adaptive Many-Core Architectures and Systems workshop (York) |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | The workshop aimed to highlight and discuss emerging trends and future directions in the field of many-core system design (and beyond), and featured invited position papers from world-leading researchers and industrialists across the field. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://www-users.york.ac.uk/~mt540/graceful-ws/index.html |
Description | Annual UK System Research Challenges Workshop |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | 50 PhD students presented their research ideas to a panel of industry and academic experts. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018,2019,2020 |
URL | https://uksystems.org/workshop/2019/ |
Description | HiPEAC Computing Systems Week |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | A cluster of workshops, EU project meetups and planning sessions organized by the HiPEAC EU network of excellence. We were involved in organizing workshops, speaking at events and networking. There were significant opportunities for follow-up with EU-based companies and university partners. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
URL | https://www.hipeac.net/csw/2019/edinburgh/#/ |
Description | Launch workshop for network |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | A launch event for the UK Manycore network, with a variety of talks, a keynote presentation, a speed networking session and a panel discussion. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
URL | https://manycore.org.uk/London_jan17.html |
Description | Linux User Group meeting |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | I spoke to a group of 30 Linux enthusiasts, explaining developments in the Operating Systems field. There was a positive response from the audience, with some wanting to study the subject more closely. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
URL | https://scotlug.org.uk/meetings/2020/january.html |
Description | Manycore Grand Challenges Workshop (Belfast) |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Study participants or study members |
Results and Impact | As part of our EPSRC network funding, we made a commitment to draw up a set of manycore grand challenges. This workshop was the first activity to kickstart this activity, with input from national research leaders and US visitors. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://manycore.org.uk/belfast2018.html |
Description | Manycore PhD Summer School 2018 (Glasgow) |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | 50 PhD students attended a week-long research summer school, with presentations and practical labs from industry researchers and practitioners. Further activities included a poster competition, a hackathon style lab and some skills training sessions. The focus of the week was Manycore systems and software. Training materials are available free online. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://manycore.org.uk/summerschool.html |
Description | Manycore network online communications |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Mailing list, website and social media channels for the UK Manycore network, with the explicit aim of improving communications in the manycore research community, particularly between industry and academia. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017,2018 |
URL | https://manycore.org.uk |
Description | Manycore workshop at HiPEAC conference 2018 in Manchester |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | A keynote talk, followed by a series of research presentations. The highlight event was a dragon's den style research competition, with volunteers giving five-minute pitches to a panel of (hypothetical) venture capitalists. A range of interesting ideas included supercomputing clusters on aircraft carriers, time-travelling microprocessors, anticipative Alexa ... |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://www.hipeac.net/events/activities/7543/marionet/ |
Description | OpenMP Users Conference |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | There were two days of talks and workshops aimed at furthering the collaboration and knowledge sharing amongst the UK community of high-performance computing specialist using OpenMP. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
URL | https://ukopenmpusers.co.uk/# |
Description | Reliable, Secure and Scalable Software Systems (RS4) workshop at Glasgow |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | We discussed the challenges of engineering reliable scalable and secure software (RS4), and some possible approaches to solving them. Some key outcomes and ongoing activities include: (1) Identification of good research ideas and strategies that address modern software and systems engineering problems; (2) Using RS4 as a platform to capture some software and systems engineering success stories and challenges from industry and academic viewpoints; (3) The identification of complementarities and synergies, as well as possibilities for collaboration/results adoptions between industry and academic participants; (4) More broadly, RS4 was aimed at identifying new challenges and trends to influence the UK and European research agenda, e.g. via the EPSRC MaRIONet and EU HiPEAC Networks. We note that the topic is closely aligned with the EPSRC's newly launched "Safe and Secure ICT" priority. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
URL | https://manycore.org.uk/60th.html |
Description | Scottish Programming Languages Seminar |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | A group of researchers gathered to exchange ideas, identify hot topics and discuss recent papers. There was a particular focus on object-oriented programming. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
URL | https://spls-series.github.io/meetings/2019/october/ |
Description | UK Manycore Developer Conference (UKMAC 2017) |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | The UK Manycore Developer Conference is an informal day of talks spanning the whole landscape of accelerated, heterogeneous and manycore computing. Topics of interest include high-performance computing, embedded and mobile systems, computational science, finance, computer vision, formal verification, and beyond. The goal of the event is to develop and bring together the UK community of manycore developers, both industrial and academic. The 2017 event was held on Tuesday 11th July 2017 at the University of Warwick. This is the eighth event in the series. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
URL | https://manycore.org.uk/ukmac2017.html |
Description | Workshop on next-generation hardware for high-performance computing (Bristol) |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | 30 people attended an interesting set of presentations from leading industrialists and academics. The workshop consisted of a series of invited talks to present novel hardware architectures and novel use of that hardware to obtain high-performance and energy efficiency. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://seis.bristol.ac.uk/~eejlny/nghpc/eehco.htm |
Description | interview for regional newspaper |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
Results and Impact | Media interview about the scope and potential of the Raspberry Pi project, leading into discussion about research opportunities with single board computers. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
URL | https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/17727166.raspberry-pi-4-the-diy-computer-taking-on-the-world/ |