App boosts ASU computer for TGen

August 12, 2010 – bizjournals.com – Original Source

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Arizona State University’s supercomputer is getting a power boost.

Technology designed for military applications is helping it move data 100 times faster, which scientists say makes it the fastest supercomputer link in the nation.

The Translational Genomics Research Institute uses ASU’s supercomputer to transfer and process data containing trillions of bits of DNA information. Computations that once took 12 days now can be processed in eight hours, said James Lowey, director of TGen’s high-performance biocomputing center.

As TGen’s technology for gathering human genome data improved in the past few years, the link between ASU’s supercomputer and TGen became inadequate to process the infor­mation, he said.

“We had a bottleneck of that link in delivering the data between the two locations,” Lowey said.

Lowey had been talking for two years with the CEO of Canada-based Obsidian Strategies about how TGen could use Obsidian’s defense industry technology, which transfers large amounts of data between government installations.

“We both have a strong belief that this is the kind of technology that can help put Arizona research on the map,” he said.

Cox Business Arizona installed a 10-gigabit lightwave fiber-optic connection between TGen’s downtown Phoenix campus and ASU’s Saguaro 2 supercomputer 10 miles away on its Tempe campus. This enhanced capability moves data up to 100 times faster between those sites.

Hyman Sukiennik, vice president of Cox Business Arizona, said Cox has invested tens of millions of dollars to upgrade its network to support systems like these.

“It’s not just a physical connection to the two locations,” he said. “It’s the backbone that supports that kind of transfer of information.”

He said it feels good to help increase TGen’s capability to find new and better ways to diagnose and treat patients.

“At the end of the day, we could be impacting lives,” he said.