Cosmos Club Presentation 12/19/02

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Cyberinfrastructure:The Future and Its ChallengesOklahoma Supercomputing Symposium 2003September 25, 2003

Peter A. Freeman

Assistant Director of NSF forComputer & Information Science & Engineering

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In summary then, the opportunity is here to createcyberinfrastructure that enables more ubiquitous,comprehensive knowledge environments that becomefunctionally complete for specific research communitiesin terms of people, data, information, tools, andinstruments and that include unprecedented capacityfor computational, storage, and communication…They can serve individuals, teams and organizations inways that revolutionize what they can do, how they doit, and who participate.

- The Atkins Report

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Overview

•Context

•A ten-year vision

•Challenges

•Q/A

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Context

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Is There a Definitionof Cyberinfrastructure (CI)?

•Not really - means different things to differentgroups - but there are commonalities

•Literally, infrastructure composed of “cyber”elements

•Includes High-End Computing (HEC, orsupercomputing), grid computing, distributedcomputing, etc. etc.

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Is There a Definitionof Cyberinfrastructure (CI)?

•Working definition: an integrated system ofinterconnected computation/communication/informationelements that supports a range of applications

•Note: There is an extant CI today. What we arereally talking about is an emergent CI.

Cyberinfrastructure is the means; “e-Science” is the result

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Cyberinfrastructureconsists of …

•Computational engines (supercomputers, clusters, workstations,small processors, …)

•Mass storage (disk drives, tapes, …)

•Networking (including wireless, distributed, ubiquitous)

•Digital libraries/data bases

•Sensors/effectors

•Software (operating systems, middleware, domain specifictools/platforms for building applications)

•Services (education, training, consulting, user assistance)

All working together in an integrated fashion.

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Hardware

Integrated Cyberinfrastructure…

Grid Services& Middleware

DevelopmentTools & Libraries

Applications

Education & Training

Discovery & Innovation

Domain Specific Cybertools

Shared CI

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http://www.cise.nsf.gov/evnt/reports/toc.htm

The Atkins Report

Daniel E. Atkins, ChairUniversity of Michigan

Kelvin K. Droegemeier University of Oklahoma

Stuart I. FeldmanIBM

Hector Garcia-MolinaStanford University

Michael L. KleinUniversity of Pennsylvania

David G. MesserschmittUniversity of California at Berkeley

Paul MessinaCalifornia Institute of Technology

Jeremiah P. OstrikerPrinceton University

Margaret H. WrightNew York University

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“[Science is] a series of peaceful interludes punctuatedby intellectually violent revolutions . . .[in which] . . . oneconceptual world view is replaced by another.”

--Thomas Kuhn

From The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

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Evolution of the ScientificEnterprise

•Pre-science (< 1000 CE)

•Observational (< 1600 CE)

•Empirical (> 1600 CE)

•Theoretical (>1650 CE)

•Computational (> 1950 CE)

•Informational (> 2000 CE)

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A Ten-year Visionfor

Cyberinfrastructure

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In Ten Years, a CI That Is…

•rich in resources, comprehensive in functionality, andubiquitous;

•easily usable by all scientists and engineers, fromstudents to emertii;

•accessible anywhere, anytime needed byauthenticated users;

•interoperable, extendable, flexible, tailorable, androbust;

•funded by multiple agencies, states, campuses, andorganizations;

•supported and utilized by educational programs at alllevels.

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Some Characteristics of a FutureCyberinfrastructure

•Built on broadly accessible, highly capable network: 100’s ofterabits backbones down to intermittent, wireless connectivity atvery low speeds;

•Contains significant and varied computing resources: 100’s ofpetaflops at high end, with capacity to support most scientificwork;

•Contains significant storage capacity: exabyte collectionscommon; high-degree of DB confederation possible;

•Allows wide range of sensors/effectors to be connected: sensornets of millions of elements attached;

•Contains a broad variety of intelligent visualization, search,database, programming and other services that are fitted tospecific disciplines

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Challenges

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Technical Challenges

•Computer Science and Engineering broadly

•How to build the components?

•Networks, processors, storage devices,sensors, software

•How to shape the technical architecture?

•Pervasive, many cyberinfrastructures,constantly evolving/changing capabilities

•How to customize CI to particular S&Edomains

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Operational Challenges

•Data standards

•General interoperability

•Resource allocation

•Security and privacy

•Training

•Continuous evolution

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Funding/Ownership Challenges

•Cooperation among agencies

•Cooperation between federal andstate/private levels

•Role of campuses

•Interaction with private industry

•$$$$$ !

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Educational Challenges

•How to make sure that future generations ofscientists and engineers can fully utilize CI

–New paradigms, methods, objectives

•How to retrain current scientists andengineers

•How to make sure that new ideas forextending CI continue to come from thosethat are using it

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CI in Transition

Principles

•Build on what we’ve learned to date

•Provide new funding opportunities for extantand emerging providers and users

•Encourage partnerships between CI usersand computing specialists

•Promote flexibility, interoperability andcompetition for best ideas

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CI in Transition

Funding Strategies

•Maintain essential CI resources and services while providingnew funding opportunities for current and future CI providersand users

•Explore new governance models, emphasizing partnershipsamong computing and domain specialists both domestic andforeign

•Advance the state-of-the-art in cyberinfrastructure capability,including the development of promising new architectures, toolsand applications

•Create a portfolio of education, outreach, training andcommunity development activities to enrich, support andexpand the impact of cyberinfrastructure on research andeducation

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Summary

•Cyberinfrastructure is already engendering arevolution in S&E

•The ubiquity, interconnectedness, and power ofCI resources in the future will radically changeS&E in the next 10 years

•Education for CI and use of CI in education arethe two greatest challenges

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The NSF CyberinfrastructureObjective

•To lead the country in providing anintegrated, high-end system of computing,data facilities, connectivity, software,services, and instruments that ...

•enables all scientists and engineers to work innew ways on advanced research problemsthat would not otherwise be solvable.

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Contact Information

Dr. Peter A. Freeman

NSF Assistant Director for CISE

Phone: 703-292-8900

Email: pfreeman@nsf.gov

Visit the NSF Web site at: