Compute and Storage
Research Computing maintains a wide range of compute, data storage, and software resources to advance the diverse research goals of our faculty and partner collaborators. Resources are maintained by MSI staff who also provide training opportunities and tools to help investigators navigate these systems and manage their resources, students and partners. If you have questions about specific hardware and software needs, please contact us at [email protected].
High Performance Computing (HPC) systems are designed with high-speed networks, high-performance storage, GPUs, and large amounts of memory to support some of today's most compute and memory-intensive programs. Research Computing's main HPC service offering is Agate, a cutting-edge supercomputing system that boasts over seven times the performance of the previous Mesabi cluster and includes a specialized GPU subsystem for interactive applications and machine-learning workloads. For researchers seeking dedicated hardware, Research Computing also offers options for purchasing expertly managed, dedicated computing resources.
Research computing offers several different data storage solutions including Dedicated Primary Storage, Dedicated Second-Tier Storage, and Dedicated Archival Tier Storage. Dedicated Primary Storage is a high performance file system that can be accessed from all MSI computing systems. This storage includes nightly snap shots and backups, general management, and maintenance. Dedicated Second-Tier Storage is a high density storage platform, well suited for storing less frequently used data. Second-Tier storage is built on a Ceph storage cluster and may be accessed using the S3 interface and via Globus. Dedicated Archival Tier Storage is a high density tape storage platform accessible via an S3-like protocol, well suited for storing archival data. Third-Tier storage can also be accessed via Globus, and is suitable for many-terabyte data storage needs.
Research Computing offers many different software packages for use by researchers in various fields of research. Our software offerings cover a diverse range of analysis and data processing needs across the life sciences, physical sciences, geospatial analysis, and humanities. In addition to our software offerings, Research Computing consultants can typically offer support for software questions. Research Computing staff are experts in many software packages and can assist with questions or recommendations when it comes to software options and troubleshooting.