Western on cloud nine with IBM, government partnership
By Dr. Hanan Lutfiyya
From healthcare systems to energy
delivery, city planning to water quality, solutions to society's most
significant challenges will increasingly be found through the capture
and analysis of large amounts data.
Mobility, analytics and cloud
computing are certainly growing areas of study with major implications
for the real world. However, there exists a major gap between the skills
required to study and tackle these 21st Century challenges and those of
the current workforce – not only in Canada, but around the world.
That
is why Western University has partnered with IBM Canada to provide
researchers and students with the leading-edge tools that will support
fundamental research and ensure that today's graduates have the
knowledge and skills required to propel society into the future.
Partnering
with IBM gives Western a significant start in addressing some
considerable problems in dealing with large-scale data. As mentioned in
the 2012 Tech Trends Report,
mining data and gleaning useful information will become the core
problem as we move into the next decade. The systems and software we
receive from IBM will help our researchers and computer scientists work
with data on a large scale.
Western has bolstered its commitment
to these areas of study and the Department of Computer Science has
devised several ways to incorporate concepts and practical experience
with regard to mobility and data in several courses.
For example,
a second year software engineering course requires students to develop a
large software project, which in the past has focused on developing a
smartphone application. Likewise, a fourth year networking course
focuses on the underlying protocols needed to support mobility,
providing students insight into the development of sophisticated
smartphone applications, as they work to develop a smartphone app and
the underlying services. Our software engineering capstone course
currently has students developing new features for the iWestern app.
We've
touted the fact that our IBM-fueled computing system is sure to help
small and medium enterprises enter the world of cloud computing and the
$65 million in computers and software contributed by IBM will certainly
be a boon to our researchers and scientists.
However, the
allocation of cloud resources for teaching purposes remains a
significant challenge and we have worked diligently to maximize our
current resources to great effect. Western strongly believes that cloud
computing is an important aspect of student education and efforts are
underway to ensure that cloud technologies continue to be a growing part
of our curriculum.
To that end, we introduced a special topics
course in web development last year that teaches many of the
foundational skills and technologies that are frequently used in
building cloud services. We are now searching for funds to support a
cloud infrastructure for teaching purposes so we can further incorporate
cloud technologies into the curriculum.
That brings us to
analytics, where we continue to delve deeper into developing innovative
programs. We currently have new courses in both medical health
informatics and digital humanities and we are looking into new programs
at both the undergraduate and graduate levels.
Looking at social
media, we have incorporated discussion within two courses, one
discussing social integration from a web design perspective and the
other built around a software development project that has students
developing Facebook applications.
Western is proud of the
significant progress made in recent years as we strive to build
students' skills in analytics, cloud computing, mobile technologies and
social business. But, we have more work to do. There is a critical need
to foster these skills in the emerging workforce and to support research
that will help us take on tomorrow's challenges. This responsibility
lies with both business and educational institutions. Working with
partners like IBM Canada, Western looks forward to taking a leadership
role in driving this agenda.
Dr. Hanan Lutfiyya is Chair of the Department of Computer Science at Western University.
IBM Canada is delivering more of its trademark blue buzz today as the technology giant is contributing a landmark $65 million of computers and software to Western University, which will exponentially enhance the collaborative efforts already underway between the two partners, as part of a recently announced $210 million research and development innovation network.
Amit Chakma and IBM Canada VP Pat Horgan
Western University announced the formation of a new Ontario-based multi-million dollar research and development computing network today with its partners, the Governments of Canada and Ontario, IBM (NYSE: IBM) and the University of Toronto.
One
of the primary nodes for the newly formed Southern Ontario Smart
Computing and Innovation Platform (SOSCIP) is Western’s Shared
Hierarchical Academic Research Computing NETwork (SHARCNET). A part of
Compute Canada, SHARCNET is a high performance computing consortium
delivering game-changing research and innovation to the world.
The computing infrastructure of Western, IBM and its university partners -- with a combined expertise in high performance and cloud computing -- will form a research platform unlike any other in Canada.
High performance computing refers to the use of supercomputers and computer clusters to solve advanced computational problems while cloud computing is the delivery of computing services via shared resources, software, and information over a network.
"One of the things this contribution from IBM gives Western is a tremendous start in addressing some very substantial problems in regards to dealing with large-scale data," says Western computer sciences professor Michael Bauer, who also serves as SHARCNET’s Associate Director. "In many, many circumstances, data will become the core problem of the next decade, not in terms of generating data but in terms of what do you do with it and how do you actually glean useful information from it."
Bauer adds Western will not only have a system with which researchers and computer scientists can begin to examine this core problem but will also receive significant software contributions from IBM, which are necessary to extract this kind of information on a large-scale.
"Western played a leading role in establishing SHARCNET, Canada's largest high-performance computing consortium, and we are excited to take the next step by using cloud computing to manage the staggering volume of digital data society creates on a daily basis," says Western President Amit Chakma. "From neuroscience to our environment and industrial applications, supercomputing holds tremendous promise for helping us make complex research decisions more quickly, while mining data for better answers."
Western's new IBM-fueled computing system will provide excellent opportunities for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to explore the applicability of cloud computing and to address many of their computational problems.
"For the financial industry, cloud technology is ideal for solving complex latency sensitive problems on large streaming data sets in real time," says Ben Bittrolff, Chief Financial Officer at London-based Cyborg Trading Systems. "Western joining forces with IBM on this major initiative is excellent news for all businesses, no matter the size, in Ontario, across Canada and undoubtedly around the world."
Western professor Mike Bauer has a long history delivering results utilizing IBM high performance computers.
Mark Daley, Principal Investigator at the Brain and Mind Institute, utilizes IBM's gift for his research in neuroscience.
IBM will invest up to $175 million through December 2014 in the project, forming the “IBM Canada Research and Development Centre” to serve as a foundation for the research initiative.
The Government of Ontario is investing $15 million towards the creation of this Centre while the Government of Canada will contribute $20 million to allow a consortium of seven southern Ontario post-secondary institutions and its lead industry partner, IBM, to install two high-performance IBM Blue Gene/Q supercomputers and develop a cloud computing and agile computing platform to underpin the initiative’s research collaboration.
IBM contributes record $65 million to Western
Mike Bauer explains cloud computing and Western's new IBM-fuelled capabilities.
President Amit Chakma speaks at IBM-SOSCIP announcement.
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Director, Media Relations
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Jeff Renaud
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Research Communications Manager
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dkeddy@uwo.ca
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