Big Data in Life Science Research Demands Advanced Networking, Computing Capabilities
Researchers in genomics, medicine and other life sciences are using big data
to tackle big issues, but big data requires more networking and computing
power. At the Internet2
Global Summit taking place in Washington, DC April 26-30,
researchers in the life sciences will meet with engineers and technology
leaders in the research and education community to discuss the advancement of
IT infrastructure and applications for big data.
Researchers at Clemson University are
using big data in the field of genomics to develop new varieties of
agricultural crops that address the issues of population pressure, bioenergy,
food security and climate change. And researchers at Arizona State University's (ASU) College of Life
Sciences' Adaptive Complex Systems Science program are using big data in the
field of precision medicine to manage and analyze genomic information and its
associated imaging data to develop disease treatments customized to the
molecular makeup of the patient and the disease.
According to Alex Feltus, an associate professor of genetics and
biochemistry at Clemson University, using big data for life sciences research
demands new methods of data storage and transfer. "Of course we need bigger
boxes, but we also need faster ways to put stuff into them," said Feltus in a
prepared statement. "There is a serious data transfer bottleneck at the
network-hard-drive interface. Thus, we need faster, reasonably priced storage
that can keep up with the advanced networks such as the Internet2 Network."
Feltus and other researchers at Clemson use the university's
high-performance computing (HPC) resource, Palmetto, and the Internet2 Network
to collaborate with other research teams across the country. "You can process
data on the fastest nodes in the world, but it's pointless for real-time
applications if the supercomputer is hooked up to a slow pipe." said Feltus.
ASU has developed the Next Generation Cyber Capability (NGCC) data science
research instrument to reduce processing time for big data and HPC research.
According to Jay Etchings, director of operations for research computing and
senior HPC architect at ASU, the NGCC is a new model of computing that enables
the integration of multidimensional molecular and clinical data required for
precision medicine.
The NGCC supports big data research through a connection to the ultrahigh
bandwidth Internet2 Network, large-scale storage, integration of multiple types
of computation, including utility computing, HPC and big data, as well as
advanced logical capabilities, such as software-defined storage and networking,
metadata processing and semantics, according to information from Internet2.
Feltus and Etchings will both be presenters at the Internet2 Global
Summit.
About the Author
Leila Meyer is a technology writer based in British Columbia. She can be reached at [email protected].