Issue 44, October 2006
NeSC News
www.nesc.ac.uk
UK e-Science All Hands Meeting hits records
Six hundred and thirty people attended
the 5th UK e-Science All Hands Meeting
in Nottingham last month. Submission
of papers and ideas for workshops
and sessions were at record levels.
84 papers were accepted out of 128
submitted, 10 out of 25 workshop
proposals were accepted and 5 out of
13 session proposals.
• how the MRC’s VOTES project is
using grid computing and e-Science
techniques to support the recruitment of
patients for a clinical trial;
Two of the workshops explored
UK-China and UK-Korea links,
demonstrating the on-going international
interest in the UK e-Science
Programme. Thirty two organisations
had booths in the exhibition area
which attracted crowds, especially for
demonstrations. The National e-Science
Centre (NeSC) organised the event
with funding from the e-Science Core
Programme. JISC (Joint Information
Systems Committee) was the main
sponsor again this year, holding
sessions about its e-framework and
e-infrastructure programmes.
• how the ESRC’s GEMEDA project
used grid computing to study the
distribution of poverty within different
ethnic minority groups;
Best paper awards were presented
for the first time at an AHM. These
went to Phil Greenwood and team
from Lancaster University and Daniel
Goodman from Oxford University who
won the best student paper award. The
Lancaster team’s paper describes an
innovative flood warning system based
on a network of intelligent sensors.
The work, which is funded by the North
West Development Agency, uses
software developed under the Core
Programme-funded Open Overlays
Project. Daniel’s winning paper
describes how he developed a workflow
language ‘Martlet’ to enable the analysis
of data in distributed databases, a
problem encountered by NERC’s
ClimatePrediction.Net project.
Other highlights included:
• the use of workflows, developed under
the EPSRC-funded myGrid project,
to deduce the proteins a bacterium
secretes from the sequence of its genes
and consequently its lifestyle. The work
has shed light on the unusual lifestyle of
the anthrax bacterium;
• new insights, gained by NERC’s
e-minerals project, into the capacity
of different iron bearing minerals to
immobilise arsenic in water;
• how large scale computer simulations,
performed using the JISC/CCLRC/
EPSRC-funded National Grid Service,
are revealing ways in which the human
immunodeficiency virus evades the
action of drugs;
• a demonstration of an AHRC-funded
project which is using grid technologies
to enable scholars in distributed, remote
locations to collaborate over the study of
medieval manuscripts;
• how PPARC’s AstroGrid infrastructure
will be used to analyse data from the
Japan/UK/US Solar-B satellite which
was launched the day after the AHM
closed;
• a grid-based system, developed under
the BBSRC’s ComparaGRID project, to
integrate genomic data across species
and so capture details of the relationship
within and across species.
Keynote speakers included Dan
Atkins, Director of the Office of
Cyberinfrastructure, NSF on the NSF’s
cyberinfrastructure programme, Robert
Gurney, Director, Environmental
Systems Science Centre at Reading
University on how e-Science is
addressing pressing environmental
issues and Stephen Emmott, Director
European Science Programme,
Microsoft Research, on the intellectual
challenges and potential rewards of
considering biological systems as
information processing systems.
AHM 2006 Proceedings are available at www.allhands.org.uk
Issue 43 August 2006
Contents
UK Training News
AHM hits Records
Training opportunities
UK Training News
The following are being run by the Training Outreach and Education (TOE)
team, formerly “the NeSC training team”:
New Partnership will empower
UK e-Science
- National Grid Service induction courses are being held in Edinburgh (9-10
November) and Reading (20-21 November)
RAVE Production Service
Launched
AHRC-EPSRC-JISC Arts
and Humanities e-Science
Initiative
JISC’s second Capital
Programme Circular
Review of network
provision for research
needs
BELIEF eInfrastructures
Conference
Other events and Current
Vacancies
======================
- An induction into EGEE and its gLite middleware is in Reading on 22-23
November.
- This will be followed by a one-day introduction to the P-GRADE portal and
GEMLCA, to be given by Tamas Kiss from the University of Westminster.
- An introduction to the Application Hosting Environment and the NGS will be
held at UCL, on 12-13 December, delivered jointly by TOE and the AHE team
led by Peter Coveney
Details of all these courses can be found via
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/training/events
We are also keen to support any groups who wish to deliver the NGS or EGEE
courses in their institutes, regions or research communities. To this end, we will
schedule one-day “Training the Trainers” events on request.
Application Developer Courses
=============================
TOE regularly delivers its NGS induction courses, to introduce the concepts
and basic services of the NGS. During the next few months we will be creating
a range of training material to help application developers to exploit these
services. Possible modules in these courses will include the use of portals,
exposing data to the NGS via OGSA-DAI;
higher-level tools for running ensembles of
jobs for parameter sweeps,.... The range
of possibilities is immense, so to help us to
prioritise this work we invite you to tell us
what these courses should include!
If you have developed applications, then
please say what training would have
saved you time; if you seek to develop
applications, then let us know what would
help you.
For more information on anything
mentioned in the newsletter, please
contact:
Alison McCall
alison@nesc.ac.uk
Telephone 0131 651 4783
Newsletter produced by:
Alison McCall and Jennifer Hurst
Next months deadline for articles is:
30 October 2006
NeSC News
Please email Mike Mineter at mjm@nesc.
ac.uk.
Successful start to GCN Webinar series
GRID Computing Now!’s first Webinar was held on October 4, on the subject
of “Business Opportunities and Challenges for Grid Markets”.
Thirty five participants logged in to hear Professor Dennis Kehoe, AiMeS’
director, and Professor John Darlington of Imperial College, as they spoke
about new mechanisms for business enabled by the next generation Internet
and computing infrastructures.
Dave Berry, GCN’s technical expert, served as moderator, and took
2
www.nesc.ac.uk
Issue 43 August 2006
New Partnership will empower UK
e-Science
A partnership which will help ensure the UK’s
international leadership in e-Science was recently
launched at the country’s premiere e-Science event.
RAVE Production Service Launched
Free early access to the production service for
Resource Aware Visualization Environment (RAVE),
enabling distributed users to collaboratively investigate
shared datasets is now available.
The Open Middleware Infrastructure Institute UK (OMIIUK) provides software and support on which the UK
e-Science community and its international collaborators
will be able to build a sustained future. Teams at
the Universities of Southampton, Edinburgh and
Manchester are putting their expertise to work with the
e-Science community in order to provide advanced tools
and components which will empower new research in a
wide range of disciplines. This activity is a key feature of
the UK’s e-Science Programme, which held its annual
All Hands Meeting in Nottingham last month.
What is RAVE ?
It is a distributed collaborative visualization
environment that utilises Grid technology to:
• Allow distributed users to simultaneously interact with
a common dataset
• Enable collaboration (synchronous & asynchronous)
through data-markup, user viewpoint sharing and
navigation assistance
• View complex data and results, even if the resources
required are beyond those available locally
• Support a wide range of devices, from hand-held
PDAs to desktop workstations to immersive Virtual
Reality devices
• Work with Windows XP, MacOS, Linux, Solaris, IRIX
environments for single applications
OMII-UK provides software, support and sustainability.
The OMII-UK web site provides a catalogue with
information about software for e-Science, a repository
for contributing and downloading software, an easy-toinstall software release that provides a proven collection
of software components for configurable installation, and
documentation, tutorials and training.
Who would be interested ?
• Professionals who work collaboratively with complex
data sets
• Bioscience researchers wishing to explore effects of
applied forces to complex molecules - molecular
modelling
• Aerospace design engineers investigating
electromagnetic effects for aircraft components electromagnetic modelling
• Teachers, where they can ‘fly’ around a dataset,
followed by students, who attach to the teacher’s
avatar to form a guided tour - distributed learning
• Media presenters for utilising large projected displays
via hand-held devices - remote control
Professor Carole Goble, Chair of OMII-UK, said: ‘It
is crucial that the wealth of software and know-how
generated by the UK e-Science programme and our
innovative Scientists is captured and made available to
all. OMII-UK is the key means of doing this.’
OMII-UK gives confidence to the user community in
adopting e-Science solutions through software support
and training, and provides collaborative mechanisms
to enable the e-Science community to help itself. It is
also engaged with the international community to define,
contribute and disseminate best practice and standards.
This is being achieved through the engagement of
OMII-UK staff in the Open Grid Forum (OGF), GIN (Grid
Interoperability Now), EGEE (Enabling Grids for
E-Science), OMII-Europe and other community
activities.
http://www.wesc.ac.uk/projectsite/rave/publicbeta/
index.html
The above page contains step-by-step instructions
on using the service, from a wizard for hosting
datasets to launching a visualization client. More
technical information is also included, such as firewall
configuration
www.omii.ac.uk
For further details, please contact:
Dr Ian Grimstead
Phone: +44 (0) 29 2087 9091
e-mail: I.J.Grimstead@cs.cf.ac.uk
NeSC News
3
www.nesc.ac.uk
Issue 43 August 2006
AHRC-EPSRC-JISC Arts and Humanities
e-Science Initiative
JISC’s second Capital Programme Circular
JISC’s second Capital Programme Circular will be
issued on 29th September, with calls in the areas
of e-Learning, e-Infrastructure, Virtual Research
Environments, Repositories and Preservation, and
Users and Innovation. This represents an investment
of £15m in project funding for ICT research and
development across higher and further education in
England and Wales. Further information about the
development areas can be found at:
www.jisc.ac.uk/capital.html
The AHRC, JISC and EPSRC are now inviting
applications for research project grants under the
e-Science Research Grants scheme. The call will
support a portfolio of research projects up to a maximum
of 48 months in duration, and for between £20,000 and
£400,000 (fEC).
The aim of the scheme is to advance research in the
A&H through the use and development of e-Science
technologies, as defined above. Projects must involve
either or both of the following:
Interested bidders are invited to attend a Town
Meeting specifically about the calls, at Jury’s Inn,
Birmingham on 11th October. Registration for the Town
Meeting will open on Monday 18th September; early
registration is advised. The Town Meeting will consist
of presentations, parallel workshops on different
programme areas and the opportunity to ask questions
on the call for proposals. Further information including
an online booking form can be found at: www.jisc.
ac.uk/index.cfm?name=event_capital_1006. The
deadline for proposals is 23rd November.
• the development of e-Science tools or resources
specifically for research in the arts and/or humanities;
• the achievement of significant research findings in an
arts or humanities subject using e-Science technologies.
Applications can request either a Research Grants
project, a Research Grants project with one/two
studentships attached OR an application for one/two
project studentships.
The closing date for the receipt of applications is 4pm on
2 November 2006 and applications must be submitted
to the AHRC through the Joint Electronic Submission
(Je-S) System.
Further information and a roadmap of what to expect
in the circular can be found at www.jisc.ac.uk/capital_
roadmap.html
Proposals may be submitted by HE institutions funded
via HEFCE and HEFCW. FE institutions in England,
which teach higher education to more than 100 fulltime equivalent students, may also submit proposals
as part of a consortium bid. Due to the funding streams
available for this programme, other institutions are not
eligible to lead a bid, but may be involved as partners
in projects.
Please note that a Open Meeting is being held on 8
September 2006 in London at Woburn House, Tavistock
Square, London, beginning at 14.00, which will provide
an opportunity to ask questions about the scheme. For
Further information please contact ICT Programme
Administrator, Heather Haskins (ahrcict@reading.ac.uk).
For Further Information regarding the scheme please
visit the AHRC website:
http://www.ahrc.ac.uk/apply/research/sfi/ahrcsi/ahrcepsrc-jisc_arts_humanities_e-science_initiative.asp
Review of network provision for research
needs
In 2005 JISC Support of Research committee
commissioned a study to investigate how well the
network provision to internationally rated UK research
departments meets the needs of their research
workers. The study was conducted in the context of
the imminent commissioning of SuperJANET51 and
entailed considering the quality and performance of
the network infrastructure between the SuperJANET5
Points of Presence and the deparments.
SC06, the premier international conference on high
performance computing, networking, storage and
analysis, will convene in November 2006 in Tampa.
This year the conference will take its inspiration from
Albert Einstein who said “Computers are incredibly
fast, accurate and stupid; humans are incredibly slow,
inaccurate and brilliant; together they are powerful
beyond imagination.”
The report has been considered by the JISC Support
of Research and JISC Networking committees and
has been shared with UCISA2
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/aboutus/committees/sub_
committees/jcsr_home/jcsr_endtoend.aspx
http://sc06.supercomputing.org/about/
NeSC News
4
www.nesc.ac.uk
Issue 43 August 2006
BELIEF eInfrastructures
Conference,
14-15 December 2006
Hotel Grand New Delhi, India
Connecting Knowledge,
Creating Value
The BELIEF eInfrastructures Conference
is a ‘must-attend’ event for anyone
involved in Grid infrastructure projects at a
national or trans-national level, as well as
researchers of eInfrastructures interested
in exploring future collaboration between
Europe and India.
In the wake of the Geant2 link with India
and the country’s connectivity priorities,
the BELIEF eInfrastructures conference
& exhibition, 14-15 December, New
Delhi, will set out valuable insights into
the trends and visions of the dynamic
eInfrastructures ecosystem in India and
Europe. Already a major IT hub, India is
becoming a major player particularly in
the area of eInfrastructures. The potential
value of connecting European with Indian
scientific knowledge is exciting - and how
best to harness this connectivity and
make it a sustainable reality for many user
communities in the two regions is a key
theme that the conference will address.
Organised by the EC FP6 funded
eInfrastructures project, BELIEF, the
conference addresses themes that are
high on both research and business
agendas. The event comes at an
opportune time as it coincides with the
start of a EC funded project EU-IndiaGrid
that extends the EGEE infrastructure to
India – another sign that the India-Europe
eInfrastructure agenda is a key dynamic
to follow in the development of the world
knowledge economy.
The conference gives you a chance
to understand and shape the agenda
through the event’s platform of plenary,
parallel and training sessions each
presented by high level experts. It will
be an ideal opportunity for research
and business to exchange knowledge,
showcase achievements and discuss the
priorities for mutual eInfrastructures cooperation between India and Europe.
The event is free of charge - to register
your participation and find out the details
of the conference programme, visit http://
www.beliefproject.org/events/internationalconferences.
NeSC News
CALL FOR PAPERS
The 1st International Workshop “Semantic Information
Integration on Knowledge Discovery” - (SIIK 2006)
http://www.ares-conf.org/siik
In conjunction with the 8th International Conference on Information
Integration and Web Based Applications & Services (iiWAS2006)
http://www.iiwas.org/conferences/iiwas2006/
4-6 December 2006,
Yogyakarta, Indonesia.
The purpose of this workshop is to bring together researchers, developers,
and practitioners to present their recent work, discuss and identify problems,
synergize different views of techniques and policies, and brainstorm future
research/development directions on semantic information integration used in
knowledge discovery.
The SIIK workshop accepts full and short research papers For paper
registration and electronic submission please use the following website:
http://www.ares-conf.org/siik/review Submitted papers will be blind
reviewed and carefully evaluated based on originality, significance, technical
soundness, and clarity of exposition.
Important Dates
September 15, 2006
October 6, 2006
October 15, 2006
December 4-6,2006
Full Papers submission
Acceptance Notification
Camera-Ready Papers
Workshop at iiWAS Conference
All accepted workshop papers will be published in the Austrian Computer
Society book series.
Second IEEE International Conference on e-Science
Amsterdam, December 4-6, 2006
http://www.escience-meeting.org/eScience2006
INVITED SPEAKERS CONFIRMED
Jim Austin, University of York, UK
Fabrizio Gagliardi/Tony Hey, Microsoft Corporation, USA Wolfgang
Gentzsch, D-Grid Germany and RENCI, USA Bob Hertzberger, University
of Amsterdam, Netherlands Ladislav Hluchy, Slovak Academy of Sciences
Jef Huisman, Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics, UvA
Peter Hunter, University of Auckland, New Zealand Carl Kesselman, USC,
USA Ed Seidel, Louisiana State University, USA
There will be 160 peer-reviewed papers presented on e-Science and Grid
Computing in main track and workshops.
For details and schedule see
http://www.escience-meeting.org/eScience2006
Early registration closes November 1, 2006 CONFERENCE December 4,
5 & 6, 2006
IV International Conference on Multimedia and ICTs in
Education (m-ICTE2006)
Full paper submission deadline: 6th November 2006
Early registration deadline: 10th October 2006
Late registration: from 11th October to 29 November, 2006 (on-site).
Check the accepted proposals so far at: http://www.formatex.org/micte2006/
acceptedabstracts.php
5
www.nesc.ac.uk
Issue 43 August 2006
EPSRC Computer Science Writing Competition 2006-07
EPSRC launched a competition in September 2006. It’s open to
everyone, from people who’ve not had any writing published before to
professional science writers.
Prizes:
Computer science writer of the year - £1000 New computer science
writer of the year - £1000 (unpublished writers only) One £500 second
prize Five £100 runner-up prizes
The two winning entries will be published in EPSRC’s magazine
Newsline and on the competition organisers’ websites. We may publish
some of the other entries.
For this competition, computer science means the study of methods
for acquiring, storing, processing, communicating and reasoning
about information, and the role of interactivity in natural and artificial
systems through the implementation, organisation and use of computer
hardware, software and other resources.
Deadline for entries, End January 2007
Judging (judges will be announced in September), February 2007
Results announced and two winning articles published, March 2007
If you want to receive updates on the competition or have any questions
please email cswriting@epsrc.ac.uk.
The computer science writing competition 2006-2007 is being organised
by EPSRC in association with the British Computer Society, the Institute
of Engineering and Technology and the Royal Academy of Engineering.
SEE Grid lll: Computational
Modelling and Decision
Support in the Solid Earth and
Environmental Community
The Solid Earth and Environment
Grid Community (SEE Grid) is an
established international Community
of Practice which brings together
people in the earth, environmental and
computing sciences to address the
issues of transparent access to data
and knowledge about the earth.
The Third SEE Grid conference will be
held in Canberra on November 30 and
December 1.
The program will provide insights
into the latest international advances
in standards and infrastructure and
highlight recent advances in modelling
and simulation.
The program and registration forms are
available on
https://www.seegrid.csiro.au/twiki/bin/
view/Main/WebHome
GCN competition winners announced
THE GRID Computing Now (GCN)/ British Computer Society (BCS) competition was
won by Gopok Goteng from Cranfield University, with his entry “Combating global
terrorism with the world wide grid”.
The winners were announced on September 28, in a ceremony at the BCS’s offices in
London.
Goteng won first prize because his entry used so many aspects of the grid, GCN
Project Manager Ian Osborne said. It proposed the use of processing power to
crunch real time data, such as CCTV footage and biometric data, to identify potential
high risk incidents. Different information sources and multi-disciplinary teams, such
as police, customs and the transport industry could link together and collaborate to
combat terrorism.
Second prize went to Zacharias Joubert, University of Hull. His entry, “Space Grid”,
suggested that grid technology could enable astronomers to measure the shadow that
an astronomical body throws on earth when it passes through the arc of a star. This
would offer a low-cost early warning system of new Near Earth Objects.
Anis Rahaman, of London South Bank University was awarded third prize for his
“Renewable Energy” entry, which detailed how grid computing could help the national
energy grid to integrate renewable energy in the current power network.
The calibre of the finalists was so high that a special commendation was also
awarded, to Nubia Gill of the University of Dundee for her entry “Lifestyle monitoring
system to improve the well-being of the elderly”.
NeSC News
6
The following positons are
available at the Brookhaven
National Lab
(http://www.bnl.gov)
GRID COMPUTING
TECHNOLOGY ENGINEER
(I-6) - Requires a bachelor’s
degree in computer science,
information technology, physics
or closely related field and
three years of experience with
facility or infrastructure software
development in support of large
scale scientific computing is
required, with an advanced
degree in computing being highly
desirable.
GRID COMPUTING
ADMINISTRATOR (I-6) - Requires
a bachelor’s degree in computer
science, physics or closely
related field and at least three
years experience in a large scale
scientific computing facility. An
advanced degree and experience
in HEP/NP computing are highly
desirable.
www.nesc.ac.uk
Issue 43 August 2006
Forthcoming Events
October
12 - 13
The Closed World of Databases meets the
Open World of the Semantic Web
e-Science Institute,
Edinburgh
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/events/701/index.cfm
17 - 19
2006 LACSI Symposium
Santa Fe, NM
http://news.taborcommunications.com/ct.jsp?
uz1332368Biz2537579
19
Workflow Optimisation in Distributed Environments
e-Science Institute,
Edinburgh
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/events/702/
25
eSI Public Lecture Series: Adoption and
Sustainability of e-Research Technologies:
From prototype to commodity
e-Science Institute,
Edinburgh
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/esi.html
27
Maintaining Long-term Access to Geospatial Data
e-Science Institute,
Edinburgh
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/events/697/
29 - 31
Women and Technology Summit
Santa Clara, CA
http://news.taborcommunications.com/ct.jsp?
uz1332368Biz2537582
31 - November 3
Storage Networking World
Orlando, FL
http://news.taborcommunications.com/ct.jsp?
uz1332368Biz2537587
1-2
GridPP17 Meeting
e-Science Institute,
Edinburgh
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/events/666/
6-7
GGUS Training
Karlsrhue, Germany
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/action/registration/egee/
index.cfm?id=714
9-10
Induction to Grid Computing and the
National Grid Service
National e-Science
Centre, Edinburgh
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/events/719/
11-17
SC2006
Tampa Convention
Centre, Florida,
USA
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/events/sc06/
21-22
Virtual Organisations and Grids:
Applications, Patterns and
Infrastructures
National e-Science
Centre, Edinburgh
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/events/725/
27-28
Re-use or Re-invention - a Roadmap
for Data Integration
e-Science Institute,
Edinburgh
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/events/709/
29 - 2 Dec
IV International Conference on
Multimedia and ICTs in Education
Seville, Spain
http://www.formatex.org/micte2006/
November
30
NeuroGrid Annual Workshop
e-Science Institute,
Edinburgh
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/esi/esi.html
December
4-6
Second IEEE International
Conference on e-Science
Amsterdam,
Netherlands
http://www.escience-meeting.org/
eScience2006
4-5
GGUS Training
Karlsruhe, Germany
http://www.nesc.ac.uk/action/registration/
egee/index.cfm?id=715
3-8
LISA ‘06
Washington, D.C.
http://news.taborcommunications.com/ct.jsp?
uz1332368Biz2537580
5-8
LCI Workshop
Montpellier,
France
http://news.taborcommunications.com/ct.jsp?
uz1332368Biz2537589
RESEARCH ASSISTANT: Scientific Data Curation and
Exploitation (EDIKT) http://www.nesc.ac.uk/career/
You will join a thriving scientific data research group at the National e
Science Centre. We focus on distributed data curation and exploitation
for life science and engineering research. You will create novel solutions
and demonstrate their effectiveness working with application researchers.
You will have a PhD in Computer Science or equivalent qualifications and
experience. Fixed Term: 3 Years Salary Scale: £20,645 - £30,902 p.a.
NeSC News
7
If you would like to hold an e-Science event at the
e-Science Institute, please contact:
Conference Administrator, National e-Science
Centre, 15 South College Street, Edinburgh, EH8
9AA
Tel: 0131 650 9833 / Fax: 0131 650 9819 /
Email: events@nesc.ac.uk
www.nesc.ac.uk