The University of Aberdeen has introduced a high-performance computer cluster from Dell to consolidate and help simplify the management of individual department research IT systems.
The infrastructure is aimed at encouraging cross-discipline collaboration with the ultimate goal of generating fresh research ideas and opportunities for scientific breakthrough.
The University of Aberdeen has a strong legacy of pioneering research and has four principal interdisciplinary focus themes: energy, the north, environment and food security, and pathways to healthy living. To expand its research potential and drive standards higher than ever before, the university needed an IT system that would offer compute power to support large amounts of data and complex simulations.
Dr Brian Robertson, head of infrastructure management at the university, said: 'Our main aim of the project is to free researchers from the burden of system management and provide a computational service backed by a dedicated team of IT professionals.
'Researchers will have more time to carry out their research rather than dealing with more mundane administrative issues. The new cluster will also open up potential for research projects across departments and encourage more collaboration to spark new and exciting opportunities.'
The new HPC cluster, named ‘Maxwell’ after the eminent Scottish physicist, was implemented with the help of Dell and Alces Software to consolidate all research computing systems used across the university’s departments.
