ACADEMIA

A multi-million pound contract for a huge computer system which will benefit academic research across the whole of the UK is to be signed by staff from the University of Edinburgh on Thursday. HECToR (High End Computing Terascale Resources) is a vast computing facility worth £113m (about $221m US Dollars) over six years. The computer will be made by the American supercomputer company, Cray Inc. It has been paid for by the UK Research Councils and will be installed at the University’s Advanced Computing Facility (ACF) on the Edinburgh Technopole estate in Midlothian. It will start work in October this year and is planned to last for six years. EPCC (Edinburgh Parallel Computing Centre) at the University of Edinburgh will direct and operate the facility. EPCC’s director, Professor Arthur Trew, said: “Traditionally progress in science has been made through theory and experiment, but an increasing range of problems now require to be simulated computationally. Examples range from climate modelling to design of new materials; from understanding sub-nuclear particles to the evolution of the Universe. “HECToR is critical for UK scientists to compete internationally. We are delighted that EPCC has again been chosen to manage this facility. The choice of Edinburgh demonstrates the University’s leadership in the field.” The Edinburgh-based super computer will provide UK scientists with the means to undertake increasingly complex research across a wide variety of projects, including: * simulating the way air interacts with aircraft wings or helicopter blades * Materials science: simulating the behaviour of materials by modelling the way their atoms interact including atomic physics and the physics of very hot materials * Chemistry and Biochemistry: the behaviour of complex molecules and the ways they interact * Medical applications: simulating the action of the heart, for example * Particle physics: modelling the interactions of the smallest particles of matter * how diseases spread and die out * modelling the way the universe develops * Ocean modelling: simulating ocean currents round the world * long-range forecasting and climate change * science and technology at the microscopic level * simulating disasters and emergency response