Funded Projects

Currently funded projects

ProjectAbstractFunding SourceYears
A Unified Grid Programming Methodology for Global e-ScienceModern science requires huge computational resources and has become Global e-Science. Going far beyond individual super computers, Grids harness geographically distributed resources: dozens of super computers, workstations, clusters of computers, data bases, together with scientific instruments, such as telescopes or synchrotrons. Currently, Grids are difficult to use because they lack key software infrastructure. We shall develop this by both extending available Grid services and by building new software tools. Australian e-Science case studies will be pursued in environmental sciences, life and health sciences, and geo-sciences and will link to global Grids extending Australia’s scientific capabilities globally.ARC Discovery2007 - 2011
A High throughput Grid based environment for real time bio-medical imagingSince the first microscope, the development and sophistication of imaging technologies have set the pace in life-sciences. The ability to “distinguish” smaller and smaller structures continues to define the foundation for biological and bio-medical research. Over the next 5 to 10 years we expect the resolution of microscopes will challenge the computational and storage capacity of current stand alone instruments. This project will develop a software architecture that integrates image capturing hardware and data analysis and storage software into a Grid of high performance computers and storage devices. The resulting system will provide a powerful scalable solution for future developments.ARC Linkage2008 - 2010
A scalable debugging framework for petascale computersThis project concerns a new approach to debugging, which will be applicable to very large 'petascale' parallel supercomputers. Our approach will make it possible to find errors in programs as they are moved from smaller systems to the new generation of enormous machines. Building on our prior successful ARC funded Discovery grants, we will devise techniques that scale to tens of thousands of processors. The outcomes will be a range of new debugging mechanisms, as well as a commercial quality implementation that can be exploited by our industry partner.ARC Linkage2008 - 2010
A scalable development environment for petascale computersIn this proposal, we aim to explore debugging constructs that can be used on much large parallel machines, and plan to investigate a data driven approach rather than the current task centric view of debugging. We aim to provide mechanisms that provide collective operations for debugging multiple processes. The basic idea is that in most circumstances users will not want to interact with an unrelated set of parallel control threads, but will want to examine and reason about large distributed data structures.US Department of Energy2009 - 2011
Application of Scientific Workflows to Ecosystems ModellingIn this project we develop a number of scientific workflows that model the effects of climate change on different eco-systems. Specifically, we use different IPCC predictions on climate, and drive numeric simulations of the effects on land use. The work is a collaborative project with the Victorian Department of Primary Industries and the Victorian e-Research Strategic Initiative (VeRSI)VeRSI2009

Recently funded projects

The Monte Carlo Grid PortalWe plan to build a Monte-Carlo portal that presents a unified interface to the various software packages (such as EGS, GEANT, SHADOW and MCSTAS), but which also hides the complexity of the underlying computational Grid. We will use Nimrod/G (from Monash) to distribute the computations. We will use state of the art portal technology, such as the JSR 168 compliant GridSphere, increasing the ability to integrate our work into existing portals. The portal will provide an environment for further research and development.DCITA2007
Parallel Operating Environment for EclipseThe Eclipse Parallel Tools Platform project addresses a range of problems that exist with the current stand-alone parallel development tools. These problems include the inability of tools to interoperate, scalability, and the lack of a single integrated development environment which, amongst other things, inhibits the adoption of software quality tools to improve software engineering practices. In this project we plan to design and develop a prototype parallel debugger for the Eclipse platform as part of the Eclipse Parallel Tools Platform Project.Los Alamos National Labs2005 - 2007
Distributed Atmospheric SciencesWe plan to deploy three atmospheric science models, C-CAM, DARLAM and CIT, across three GrangeNet connected resources. When combined, these models can provide detailed air pollution control strategies to be performed under a variety of different climatic and weather conditions. Figure 1 depicts a typical configuration in which the coarse grain model, C-CAM is used to drive the boundary conditions of the regional weather model, DARLAM. The output of DARLAM is subsequently used to drive different photochemical pollution scenarios.DCITA2005 - 2006
Enterprise Grid LaboratoryAustralia has invested heavily in production high performance computing facilities over recent years, creating significant opportunities for Australian computational scientists. But, the nature of these resources makes them inappropriate for research in experimental computer science, because it is not possible to modify the operating environment, system hardware and software configuration. This proposal seeks to construct a testbed of networked cluster computers to support existing and new research into enterprise grids. The infrastructure will be distributed among four sites so that experiments can be run locally and remotely crossing administrative domains, incurring communication overheads, and heterogeneity.ARC Linkage Infrastructure2006
eScience and Climate: Using Grid technology to build capacity in studies of Australian climate variabilityAustralia possesses capability in the area of palaeoclimate modelling, but efforts to understand our past natural climate variations are hampered by the computational profligacy of such models. Further, Australia does not possess a capability in intermediate complexity models which would allow experiments that take account of tectonic time scales. This initiative aims to develop a framework to allow the integration of climate system models with grid computing approaches (such as Nimrod/G) and test this framework on a pilot study of the Australian palaeomonsoon system. In addition, we will use this initiative to develop international linkages to enhance our ability to address problems of importance to Australian natural climate variability.ARC Special Research Initiatives2006