TACC deploys new data intensive computing resource

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Found at HPCwire

“Corral,” a system for data-intensive computing and storage, is the newest resource to be deployed by the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) at The University of Texas at Austin.

…Corral will support database, file system and Web-based access, as well as other network protocols for storage and retrieval of data from local and remote sources. Corral’s high-performance parallel file system, based on Lustre, will be accessible from TACC’s world-class computational resources, Ranger and Lonestar. The system will also be accessible from Stallion, the world’s highest-resolution tiled display, and from Spur, TACC’s remote visualization system, enabling mathematical and visual analysis of petabyte-scale datasets. Corral will host Web applications and services for access to data from anywhere on the Internet.

The deployment is in partnership with DataDirect Networks (DDN) and Dell. There are several interesting projects lined up to use the new platform that you don’t usually find affiliated with an HPC center

…Herbarium Digitization, The University of Alaska Museum of the North — One of the world’s premier collections of arctic and boreal plants. With support from the National Science Foundation, the Herbarium is taking high-resolution digital photographs of 230,000 pressed plants to capture data about the collection and to make these specimens more accessible for research and education.

…Center for Space Research (CSR), The University of Texas at Austin — CSR will use Corral for two important space-based projects — imagery data and geospatial data for emergency response operations, and high-precision gravity data processing.

..Institute for Classical Archaeology (ICA), Liberal Arts, The University of Texas at Austin — ICA will use Corral to preserve, protect and disseminate two dynamic datasets to the wider academic community and the public.

The system is starting relatively small, but is designed to expand. The initial configuration includes 1.2 PB of SATA disk, 10 Lustre file system server nodes, and six database, web, and application server nodes with 10 GbE connections.