Collaboration fuels innovation in software development: IBM announced its partnership with eight leading universities and the Ontario Centres of Excellence to establish a unique collaboration model that will advance the development of next-generation software services and applications, including Web 2.0 innovations. This initiative is being developed and supported by an IBM Shared University Research grant. The Centre of Excellence for Research in Adaptive Systems (CERAS) will explore the use of virtualization and model-driven engineering technologies to develop, evolve, and deploy adaptive software systems. Adaptive systems allow companies to reduce costs by optimizing the use of their computing resources and by automating the management tasks currently performed by experts. The growth and proliferation of the Internet has fueled an increased need for adaptive software solutions. Using the virtual resources of CERAS, university researchers will have the power to develop applications that easily adapt to changes in operating conditions and exhibit autonomic computing capabilities. One of the early users of the CERAS resources is Dr. Igor Jurisica, the Canada Research Chair in Integrative Computational Biology at the Ontario Cancer Institute, and an Associate Professor in the Departments of Computer Science and Medical Biophysics at the University of Toronto, who developed advanced software applications that detect early-signs of cancer. CERAS will provide a powerful infrastructure to test and run multiple applications in heterogeneous computing environments," said Dr. Jurisica. "With on demand access to flexible computing resources, universities and businesses associated with the CERAS program can reduce the cost of IT ownership while increasing their productivity. We can focus on solving complex biomedical problems and not worry about how to effectively execute multiple batch and interactive applications in a virtual grid." "The CERAS collaboration represents a commitment of academia and industry to work together to advance areas in adaptive software, Web 2.0 and other emerging technologies," said Jerry Cuomo, IBM Fellow, WebSphere CTO, and Director WebSphere Technology Institute. "The establishment of this collaboration builds on our ongoing work to promote virtual computing, e-learning and next-generation software development. CERAS will complement the work done at the Virtual Computing Initiative, established between IBM and universities in North Carolina." CERAS members include IBM and the Centre for Advanced Studies at the IBM Toronto Lab, Ontario Centres of Excellence, University of Toronto, Carleton University, University of Waterloo, Queen's University, York University, Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya (Spain), North Carolina State University, and University Health Network in Ontario.