Sustainable Funding and Business Models for Academic Cyberinfrastructure (CI) Facilities

The final report for the National Science Foundation-sponsored workshop "Sustainable Funding and Business Models for Academic Cyberinfrastructure Facilities” is available. A distinguished group of 119 cyberinfrastructure facility directors, HPC center directors, research VPs, and CIOs participated in the 2010 workshop held at Cornell University. Links to the workshop presentations and 28 contributed position papers are available below.

Workshop Background

• NSF Proposal
• Agenda
• Speaker Biographies
• Breakout Discussion Topics
• Final NSF Report

Workshop Presentations and Breakouts

• Cornell CAC Sustainability Model - David Lifka
• Bridging Campuses to National Cyberinfrastructure – Overview of OCI Sustainable Center Activities - Jennifer Schopf
• Penn State Sustainability Model - Vijay Agarwala
• Sustainability for HPC Centers: A Macro View - Jim Bottum
• Open Discussion on the Need for Collaboration and Advocacy - Henry Neeman
• Dan Atkins' Principles - Dan Atkins
• Organizational Models, Staffing & Succession Planning - breakout notes
• Funding Models, Industry & Vendor Relationships - breakout notes
• Metrics of Success and Return on Investment - breakout notes

Contributed Position Papers

Papers available with author's permission.

1. Allen, G. & Katz, D.S. (2009). Computational science, infrastructure and interdisciplinary research on university campuses: experiences and lessons from the Center for Computation and Technology. Louisiana State University position paper.
2. Goldiez, B., Tafur, S. & Palaniappian, R. (2009). HPC sustainability plan and position paper. University of Central Florida position paper.
3. Smith, P. (2009). HPC sustainability (metrics). Texas Tech High Performance Computing Center position paper.
4. Furlani, T. (2010). Metrics of success and return on investment. University of Buffalo Center for Computational Research position paper.
5. Kennedy, C.L. & Sheldon, P. (2010). The Vanderbilt Advanced Computing Center for Research and Education.
6. Dougherty, M. (2010). High performance computing sustainability at the University of Southern California.
7. Crane, G., Robinson, J.-P. & Smith, P. (2010). Enabling and sustaining campus-to-campus cyberinfrastructure. Southeastern Universities Research Association position paper.
8. Joiner, D. (2010). The New Jersey Institute for Modeling and Visualization.
9. Beck, S.D. (2010). Computational research across the curriculum: addressing the challenges of sustainable HPC at the academy. Louisiana State University Center for Computational & Technology position paper.
10. Lifka, D., Alvord, R., Mehringer, S. & Redfern, P. (2010). Overview of the Cornell University Center for Advanced Computing sustainable funding model.
11. Atlas, S. R. (2010). White paper submitted to the NSF Workshop on High Performance Computing Center Sustainability.
12. Bose, R., Crosswell, A. Hamilton, V. & Mesa, N. (2010). Piloting sustainable HPC for research at Columbia.
13. Devins, R. & Elledge, A. (2010). A user-centric approach to HPC sustainability. Vermont Advanced Computing Center position paper
14. Pummill, J., Brunson, D. & Apon, A. (2010). Community funding models for computational resources.
15. Sills, E. (2010). North Carolina State University model for providing campus high performance computing services.
16. Liu, H. (2010). The sustainability of high performance computing at Louisiana State University.
17. Wilgenbusch, J. (2010). Sustainable research computing at Florida State University.
18. Deumens, E. & Taylor, C. (2010). Experiences with sustainability at the University of Florida HPC Center.
19. Adrion, R., Blank, K., Hill, C., Kurose, J. & Ruckenstein, A. (2010). A Massachusetts green high-performance academic research computing facility.
20. Papadopoulos, P., Moore, R. & Hawkins, R. (2010). The Triton Resource at UCSD – implementing sustainable HPC at the University of California.
21. Clebsch, B., Steinhardt, S.., Ricks, M. & Reese, P. (2010). Culture change and research computing at Stanford.
22. Lim, R., Jung, G., Welcome, T., Moore, R., Papadopolous, P., Mori, W.B. & Alvarez, R. (2010). University of California shared research computing services pilot program.
23. Mori, W., Davis, J. & Labate, B. (2010). The UCLA shared cluster hosting program, providing sustainable HPC Services at UCLA.
24. Krishnamurthy, A., Gordon, S., Kelley, K., Wohlever, K. & Chalker, A. (2010.) Data center needs for a sustainable HPC center: issues facing the Ohio Supercomputer Center.
25. Hillegas, C. (2010). Princeton University position paper for the NSF Workshop – Sustainable Funding and Business Models for High Performance Computing Centers.
26. McMullen, R. & Monaco, G. (2010). The role of regional cyberinfrastructure in sustaining campus high performance computing centers.
27. Combariza, J.E. (2010). Research computing cyberinfrastructure at Dartmouth College.
28. Modi, J., Schwenker, A., Sinha, R. & Tolly, M. (2010). Survey of CASC members on the role of industrial partnership programs in high performance computing center sustainability.

Related Papers, Presentations and Web Sites

• Voloudakis, J. (2010). A systemic model for IT economic sustainability. EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research, bulletin 1.
• Berman, F. (2008). Making research and education cyberinfrastructure real. EDUCAUSE Review, vol. 43, no.4.
• Lifka, D. (2010). High Performance Computing Center Sustainability NSF Workshop. Invited presentation at the Coalition for Academic Scientific Computation (CASC) Fall 2009 meeting.
• Education Advisory Board (2009). University business executive roundtable agenda - national best practice initiatives 2009-2010.

Organizing Committee

• Stanley C. Ahalt, Ph. D., Director, Renaissance Computing Institute (email)
• Amy W. Apon, Ph. D., Director, Arkansas High Performance Computing Center, University of Arkansas (email)
• David Lifka, Ph. D., Director, Cornell University Center for Advanced Computing (email)
• Henry Neeman, Ph. D., Director, OU Supercomputing Center for Education & Research, University of Oklahoma (email)

Acknowledgements

The “Sustainable Funding and Business Models for Academic Cyberinfrastructure Facilities” report and workshop was funded in part by the National Science Foundation Office of Cyberinfrastructure grant number 0944039. The Organizing Committee gratefully acknowledges the National Science Foundation, Dell Inc. and Intel Corporation for their support of this workshop. The Committee would also like to thank everyone who took time to attend the workshop for their open and collegial participation and the Cornell University Center for Advanced Computing for hosting the workshop.