SCIENCE

DataDirect Networks (DDN) announced that Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) selected DDN's Storage Fusion Architecture (SFA) 10000 data management platform to power a range of research efforts throughout the university, including at Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI) and Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI).

The ability of the SFA10000 to cost-effectively handle all of Virginia Tech's high-performance computing needs has prepared the university to enter a new era of breakthrough research, said Harold "Skip" Garner, the executive director of the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute.

"DDN is helping us move to the next stage of the institute's development with passion, excitement, and a firm commitment to helping address some of society's most important problems in the life sciences and biomedicine. With DDN's technology in place, our researchers are only limited by their imaginations," Garner said.

The DDN storage platform is being used by the Bioinformatics Institute in a wide variety of research areas. Gene sequencing is an important focus of VBI, generating a deluge of data stored in their DDN system and InfiniBand connected to their cluster to analyze the role that genetics plays in cancer. Another area of research is the study of epidemics to model and understand how diseases spread through a population and what mechanisms can be used to limit the spread of the disease.

"DDN's technology stood out from other storage options for a lot of reasons, including its industry leading performance, its dramatically lower total cost of ownership, and its vast scalability for handling the huge datasets used by our researchers," said Kevin Shinpaugh, director of high-performance computing and information technology services for the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute. "But what is most impressive about the SFA10000 is its ability to handle orthogonally divergent computing tasks, such as managing both home files and scratch files, with no performance trade-offs."

"We are honored to support the many critical research projects taking place at Virginia Tech, including its efforts to prevent diseases, improve transportation and develop new technologies that will shape our future," said Paul Bloch, President, DDN. "The world-leading performance, density and scalability of the SFA10000 will ensure that Virginia Tech's researchers have instant access to all their files and applications, regardless of size or performance requirements. The SFA 10000 offers great value to the publicly and privately funded research efforts at Virginia Tech by supporting the highest density and greatest power, cooling, and space efficiencies in the world."