Streamline delivers metabolomics & DNA sequence analysis platform to Exeter University
08/09/10 12:59 Filed in: Press
The Biosciences department at Exeter University recently took delivery of a complex high performance computing system from Streamline Computing to cope with a large and sudden increase in the need for metabolomics and 2nd and 3rd generation DNA sequence analysis driven by the Systems Biology Initiative. Biosciences commissioned Streamline Computing to design, implement, deliver, tune and support a shared high performance computing platform that would allow it to meet the computational needs of its rapidly increasing user base of lecturers, researchers and postgraduate students. With performance requirements expected to increase over time, Systems Biology researchers required a computing system which was easily expandable and able to scale with the rapid increases in data analysis, annotation and user requirements.
Streamline Computing was engaged to design and deliver a heterogeneous computing system based around a mixture of high performance compute nodes: high density and powerful slave nodes for high throughput serial jobs and high memory 'fat' nodes for memory intensive tasks such as sequence assembly. The system has been implemented with a Gluster parallel file system for the high performance data access often required by sequence analysis and annotation applications and pipelines.
An important consideration in choosing a system design was that the system has to be easily expandable and adaptable as and when additional funding becomes available and computational needs change. In addition, the department was keen to have a computing facility that required minimal management through state of the art monitoring and administration systems but that also had a high degree of support should the system ever need it, given its position as a centralised service for various Exeter University departments. Streamline Computing has been able to deliver on both counts. Utilising its contemporary tried and tested software stack and system design, combined with a deployment of Concurrent Thinking's ConcurrentCOMMAND monitoring and administration appliance, Streamline has been able to deliver a system with a significantly reduced management and administration overhead allowing more financial resource to be spent on delivering additional computational capacity rather than administration costs. The Systems Biology initiative was able to adopt this approach because the system is underpinned by a range of support services provided by Streamline Computing and designed to keep the system and its services up and running with high efficiency and availability.
"Our Streamline platform provides us with an unprecedented ability to analyse gigabase datasets. With Streamline support we are able to maximise the amount of time we spend analysing data and gaining new biological insights, rather than maintaining the cluster. With its ability to expand nodes, storage and upgrade interface, it should see us well into the future", said Dr Konrad Paszkiewicz, Head of Exeter University's Sequence and Bioinformatics Services.
"Streamline Computing is very pleased to be able to provide and support a cutting edge computing facility to Exeter University's leading life science and bioinformatics researchers" said Dr Richard Groves, Chief Operating Officer at Streamline Computing. "As high performance and cloud computing technologies rapidly evolve, Streamline has shown that it is possible to deliver a state of the art yet cost effective and scalable system that enables Exeter University's Bioscience department to deliver value within the exacting demands of modern DNA sequence analysis, metabolomics and Systems Biology".
About Streamline Computing:
Warwick-based Streamline Computing is the UK's leading provider of High Performance Computing clusters and services. With specialist knowledge of operating systems, end-user applications and cluster middleware, Streamline provides integrated compute, storage and visualization solutions with outstanding value for money and maximum system performance. Streamline reduces the total cost of owning an HPC capability by offering pre-qualified commodity hardware, fault-tolerant system designs, professional management tools and first-class system support. From turn-key industrial systems to campus-wide HPC systems, Streamline delivers HPC solutions to the oil, aerospace, manufacturing, auto-racing and pharmaceutical industries that are tuned to meet its customers’ budgets and needs.
Streamline Computing was engaged to design and deliver a heterogeneous computing system based around a mixture of high performance compute nodes: high density and powerful slave nodes for high throughput serial jobs and high memory 'fat' nodes for memory intensive tasks such as sequence assembly. The system has been implemented with a Gluster parallel file system for the high performance data access often required by sequence analysis and annotation applications and pipelines.
An important consideration in choosing a system design was that the system has to be easily expandable and adaptable as and when additional funding becomes available and computational needs change. In addition, the department was keen to have a computing facility that required minimal management through state of the art monitoring and administration systems but that also had a high degree of support should the system ever need it, given its position as a centralised service for various Exeter University departments. Streamline Computing has been able to deliver on both counts. Utilising its contemporary tried and tested software stack and system design, combined with a deployment of Concurrent Thinking's ConcurrentCOMMAND monitoring and administration appliance, Streamline has been able to deliver a system with a significantly reduced management and administration overhead allowing more financial resource to be spent on delivering additional computational capacity rather than administration costs. The Systems Biology initiative was able to adopt this approach because the system is underpinned by a range of support services provided by Streamline Computing and designed to keep the system and its services up and running with high efficiency and availability.
"Our Streamline platform provides us with an unprecedented ability to analyse gigabase datasets. With Streamline support we are able to maximise the amount of time we spend analysing data and gaining new biological insights, rather than maintaining the cluster. With its ability to expand nodes, storage and upgrade interface, it should see us well into the future", said Dr Konrad Paszkiewicz, Head of Exeter University's Sequence and Bioinformatics Services.
"Streamline Computing is very pleased to be able to provide and support a cutting edge computing facility to Exeter University's leading life science and bioinformatics researchers" said Dr Richard Groves, Chief Operating Officer at Streamline Computing. "As high performance and cloud computing technologies rapidly evolve, Streamline has shown that it is possible to deliver a state of the art yet cost effective and scalable system that enables Exeter University's Bioscience department to deliver value within the exacting demands of modern DNA sequence analysis, metabolomics and Systems Biology".
About Streamline Computing:
Warwick-based Streamline Computing is the UK's leading provider of High Performance Computing clusters and services. With specialist knowledge of operating systems, end-user applications and cluster middleware, Streamline provides integrated compute, storage and visualization solutions with outstanding value for money and maximum system performance. Streamline reduces the total cost of owning an HPC capability by offering pre-qualified commodity hardware, fault-tolerant system designs, professional management tools and first-class system support. From turn-key industrial systems to campus-wide HPC systems, Streamline delivers HPC solutions to the oil, aerospace, manufacturing, auto-racing and pharmaceutical industries that are tuned to meet its customers’ budgets and needs.