Perspectives on Cyberinfrastructure

Daniel E. Atkinsatkins@umich.edu

Professor, University of MichiganSchool of Information & Dept. of

EECSOctober 2002

(Cyber) infrastructure• The term infrastructure has been used since the

1920’s to refer collectively to the roads, bridges, rail lines, and similar public works that are required for an industrial economy to function.

• The recent term cyberinfrastructure refers to an infrastructure based upon computer, information and communication technology (increasingly) required for discovery, dissemination, and preservation of knowledge.

• Traditional infrastructure is required for an industrial economy. Cyberinfrastructure is required for an information economy.

Cyberinfrastructure: the Middle Layer

Base-technology: computation, storage, communication

Cyberinfrastructure: hardware, software, personnel, services,

institutions

Applications in science and engineering research and

education

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Trends & Issues

• Components Circuit speed flattening in about 6 years, then

most increase from improving chip density and massive parallelism. New technology curves?

Disk capacity increase 60-100% per year. Networking: 1.6 Terabits/sec running in labs on

a single fiber (40 channels at 40 gigabits/sec.). Ubiquitous wireless.

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Computational Diversity

• Capability not just capacity: technology, policy, tools.• Still need some center-based leading- edge,super computers.• On-demand supercomputing,not just batch.

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Content

• Digital everything; exponential growth; conversion and born-digital.

• S&E literature is digital. Microfilm-> digital for preservation. Digital libraries are real and getting better.

• Distributed (global scale), multi-media, multi-disciplinary observation. Huge volume.

• Need for large-scale, enduring, professionally managed/curated data repositories.

• New modes of scholarly communication emerging.• IP, openness, ownership, privacy, security issues

Converging Streams of Activity

GRIDS (broadly defined)

E-science

CI-enabled Science & Engineering Research & Education

Science-driven pilots (not using above labels)

ITFRU Scholarly communicationin the digital age

National PetascaleSystems

National PetascaleSystems

UbiquitousSensor/actuator

Networks

UbiquitousSensor/actuator

Networks

LaboratoryTerascaleSystems

LaboratoryTerascaleSystems

Ubiquitous Infosphere

CollaboratoriesCollaboratories ResponsiveEnvironmentsResponsive

EnvironmentsTerabit

Networks

ContextualAwarenessContextualAwareness

SmartObjectsSmart

Objects

Building Out

Building Up

Science, Policy and Education

PetabyteArchivesPetabyteArchives

Futures: The Computing Continuum

Components of CI-enabled science & engineering

CollaborationServices

Knowledge managementinstitutions for collection buildingand curation of data, information,

literature, digital objects

High-performance computingfor modeling, simulation, data

processing/mining

Individual &Group Interfaces& Visualization

Physical World

Humans

Facilities for activation,manipulation and

construction

Instruments forobservation andcharacterization.

GlobalConnectivity

A broad, systemic, strategic conceptualization

Community Planning Guidance Examples from Geosciences

Consultation with

environmental community

leaders

NSF - Nov. 19, 2001

Instruments

Picture ofdigital sky

Knowledge from Data

Sensors

Picture ofearthquakeand bridge

Wireless networks

Personalized Medicine

More Diversity, New Devices, New Applications

Cyberinfrastructure is a First-Class Tool for Science

Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation

Field Equipment

Laboratory Equipment

Remote Users

Remote Users

High-Performance Network(s)

Instrumented Structures and Sites

Leading Edge Computation

Curated Data Repository

Laboratory EquipmentGlobal Connections

From Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Speech to the Royal

Society (23 May 2002)

• What is particularly impressive is the way that scientists are now undaunted by important complex phenomena. Pulling together the massive power available from modern computers, the engineering capability to design and build enormously complex automated instruments to collect new data, with the weight of scientific understanding developed over the centuries, the frontiers of science have moved into a detailed understanding of complex phenomena ranging from the genome to our global climate. Predictive climate modelling covers the period to the end of this century and beyond, with our own Hadley Centre playing the leading role

internationally. • The emerging field of e-science should transform this kind of work. It's

significant that the UK is the first country to develop a national e-science Grid, which intends to make access to computing power, scientific data repositories and experimental facilities as easy as the Web makes access to information.

• One of the pilot e-science projects is to develop a digital mammographic archive, together with an intelligent medical decision support system for breast cancer diagnosis and treatment. An individual hospital will not have supercomputing facilties, but through the Grid it could buy the time it needs. So the surgeon in the operating room will be able to pull up a high-resolution mammogram to identify exactly where the tumour can be found.