Apple Installation Boosts Scientific Information Processing

Profiles in Success: University of Freiburg

Scientific information analysis has received a significant boost from a new Apple Xgrid installation at the University of Freiburg in Germany. The technology needed by the university’s scientists to better analyse research data of material and life sciences is being provided by the Apple Research & Technology Support (ARTS) programme. An innovative skin cancer research project has become one of the first projects to benefit from the increase in computing power.

“Scientists are skilled in using computers, but these days their research often requires the power of grid computing, and they are not skilled in parallel computation”, says Dr Andreas W Liehr, Head of Scientific Information Processing service group for the Materials Research Centre, University of Freiburg.

“We want to apply Apple’s technology for the development of user friendly software so that scientists can easily activate complex computational tasks — just like pressing a print button”.

The University of Freiburg was founded in 1457. During its long history it has developed an excellent reputation in teaching natural sciences, social sciences and the humanities. It has a student population of around 20,000, and boasts 17 affiliated Nobel laureates.

The Materials Research Centre, or Freiburger Materialforschungszentrum (FMF), is a central research institute for the university, supported by the physics, applied sciences, medicine, biology, chemistry, pharmacy and earth sciences faculties. It undertakes pure and applied research into new materials and materials-related technologies, exploiting the interdisciplinary knowledge of its 250 staff and students.

FMF’s Scientific Information Processing service group provides technology support to the researchers. “FMF scientists are usually specialists in a field of research such as rheology or dermatology”, says Dr Liehr. “My service group comprises computational physicists, who specialise in data analysis and information management. We support the project groups of the FMF to meet their research objectives”.

A major challenge for the service group is managing the data bottleneck caused by the increasing need for analysis of large data sets. “Analysing a batch of Atomic Force Microscopy images for a certain fingerprint, or analysing a time series of reflectance spectra by means of a certain physical model, can easily take the computational effort of several days”, says Dr Liehr. “That can delay the scientific work significantly”.

Grid computing is an obvious solution, enabling the computational tasks of each project to be distributed. However, the science researcher is not usually equipped to manage grid resources on his own. “What the typical scientist user wants is quite simple”, says Dr Liehr. “He wants to attend to the scientific content of his research and does not want to become acquainted with the technical details of distributed computing or programming data analysis algorithms”.

When Dr Liehr heard about the ARTS programme, he saw an opportunity to meet FMF’s needs on the Apple platform.

Next Page: Tailored to Scientists’ Needs

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