IBM gives IU $1 million grant

IBM announced Tuesday that it will award IU a $1 million grant to upgrade one of the University's supercomputers. After the upgrade, the computer will be able to perform about 300 billion mathematical operations per second, making it one of the 100 most powerful supercomputers in the world. \nCraig Stewart, director of research and academic computing at University Information Technology Services, said this is the third consecutive year in which IBM has given IU at least $1 million to fund research technology. \nStewart said the IBM-funded upgrade will allow the University's supercomputer to be split into two parts. One machine will be based on the Bloomington campus and the other will be placed on the Indianapolis campus. These will be used for separate tasks or simultaneously for a single assignment.\n"This grant from IBM will further IU's accomplishments in areas such as simulation of the early evolution of the galaxy and development of methods for managing tremendously large data sets," Stewart said. "This grant will facilitate research by faculty members and graduate students at IUB and IUPUI, and strengthen IU's legacy of accomplishment in these and other important areas of scientific research."\nThe IBM grant will create a supercomputer unlike anything IU has, said Vice President for Information Technology Michael McRobbie.\n"The grant will help create a unique supercomputer resource distributed across IU's two main research campuses in Indianapolis and Bloomington," McRobbie said in a press release. "IU's high-speed optical fiber network will integrate the computers into a single massive computing resource."\nChristopher Peebles, dean of academic computing, said he is enthusiastic about the grant and the possibilities it brings.\n"Supercomputing today has gotten to the point where it allows humans to do impressive things that they would not otherwise be able to do," he said. "It takes bits of the universe and makes them available for inspection in no other way. Our facility continues to provide a level of computational power for both scientists and artists that's unmatched in any other university."\nThis is the third major grant for IU this year. In September, the University received a $3 million grant from Digital Libraries Initiative-Phase Two, a federal program financed by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Science Foundation. That money is going toward the establishment of a digital music library. \nIn December, IU garnered $105 million, its largest grant ever, from Lilly Endowment Inc. to create the Indiana Genomics Initiative. Its objective will be to advance technology in the School of Medicine.\n"This facility is not here for just a few faculty researchers," Peebles said. "It's also open to undergraduate and graduate students. Everyone can use it"