The Atkins Report

1. The Atkins Report Paul Messina, as modified by Rich Hirsh

2. The Report is out! • Available off the NSF CISE page • Accompanying letter from Peter Freeman, AD CISE • excellent job … in highlighting the importance of cyberinfrastructure to all of science and engineering research and education • The path forward that this report envisions … truly has the potential to revolutionize all fields of research and education • [implementation of the recommendations] may eventually be seen as more of a revolution in the behavior of scientists and engineers than in the technology they use

3. Formal Charge WRT meeting needs of the scientific and engineering research community: • A) Evaluate the current PACI programs. • B) Recommend new areas of emphasis for CISE Directorate, “Cyber-infrastructure” • C) Recommend an implementation plan to enact recommended changes.

4. Panel Members • Daniel E. Atkins, Chair, Univ. of Michigan, EECS and SI, atkins@umich.edu • Kelvin K. Droegemeier, Center for Analysis and Prediction of Storms, University of Oklahoma, kkd@ou.edu • Stuart I. Feldman, IBM Research, sif@us.ibm.com • Hector Garcia-Molina, CS Dept., Stanford University, hector@cs.standford.edu • Michael Klein, Center for Molecular Modeling, University of Pennsylvania, klein@lrsm.upenn.edu • Paul Messina, Cal Tech, messina@cacr.caltech.edu • David G. Messerschmitt, UC-Berkeley, EECS & SIMS, messer@eecs.berkeley.edu • Jeremiah P. Ostriker, Princeton University, jpo@astro.princeton. • Margaret H. Wright, Computer Science Department, Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, New York University, mhw@cs.nyu.edu

5. Cyberinfrastructure: the Middle Layer Applications in science and engineering research and education Cyberinfrastructure: hardware, instruments, sensors, software, tools, personnel, services, institutions Base-technology: computation, storage, communication

6. Some roles of cyberinfrastructure • Processing, storage, connectivity • Performance, sharing, integration, etc • Data from any source, available to anyone • Make it easy to develop and deploy new applications • Tools, services, application commonality • Interoperability and extensibility enables future collaboration across disciplines • Greatest need is software and experiencedpeople

7. Landscape for Cyber-Infrastructure Initiative ASC PACI’s Pittsburgh TSC TeraGrid Some ITR Projects Digital Library Initiatives Cyber- Infrastructure Initiative Networking Initiatives Middleware Initiatives Other CISE Research Collaboratories Scientific Data Collection/Curation Initiatives in non-CISE Directorates NSB Research Infrastructure Review Initiatives in DOE, NIH, DOD, NASA, … International Initiatives: UK e-science, Earth Simulator, EU Grid & 6th FW

8. Key Points About the Proposed Initiative • There is grass roots vision and demand from broad S&E research communities. Many needs will not be met by commercial world. • Scope is broad, systemic, strategic. A lot more than supercomputing. Extreme science - not flops. Potential to relax constraints of distance, time, and disciplinary boundaries. New methods: computation, visualization, collaboration, intelligent instruments, data mining, etc. • Opportunity to leverage significantly prior NSF and other government investments. Potential large opportunity cost for not acting soon. • The initiative is intrinsically international: cooperation and competition. Can’t assume US is in the lead.

9. Key Points About the Proposed Initiative (cont.) • Connectively, interoperability ( GRID accessible, pluggable) is an essential design constraint. • Requires a holistic approach. Addressing mix of technical and social opportunities/constraints. • Focus is on S&E research but there are much broader implications for education (work force development) and economic leadership. Highly relevant to the future of higher education at large. • Requires significant additional and long term funding; high degree of coordination and balancing of self-interests from multiple stakeholders. Requires leadership by NSF and a multi-agency strategy.Not business as usual.

10. Key Principles • High-end scientific computational resources available to the United States academic research community should be second to none, and • The NSF should assume lead responsibility in conjunctionwith other appropriate mission agencies for creating and maintaining the crucial data repositories necessary for contemporary, data driven science. • The definition of crucial will come from the research communities.

11. Components of CI-enabled science & engineering A broad, systemic, strategic conceptualization High-performance computing for modeling, simulation, data processing/mining Humans Instruments for observation and characterization. Individual & Global Connectivity Group Interfaces Physical World & Visualization Facilities for activation, manipulation and Collaboration construction Services Knowledge management institutions for collection building and curation of data, information, literature, digital objects

12. Research in technologies, systems, and applications Operations in support of end users Development or acquisition Coordination (synergy) Matrix Applications of information technology to science and engineering research Cyberinfrastructure in support of applications Core technologies incorporated into cyberinfrastructure

13. Shared Opportunity & Responsibility • Only domain science and engineering researchers can create a vision and implement the methodology and process changes • Information technologists need to be deeply involved • What technology can be, not what it is • Conduct research to advance the supporting technologies and systems • Applications inform research • Need hybrid teams across disciplines and job types. • Need participation from social scientists in design and evaluation of the CI enabled work environments. • Shared responsibility. Need mutual self-interest.

14. Need highly coordinated, persistent, major investment in… • Research and development (CI as object of R&D)) • Base technology • CI components & systems • Science-driven pilots • Operational services • Distributed but connected (Grid) • Exploit commonality, interoperability • Advanced, leading-edge but… • Robust, predictable, responsive, persistent

15. Need highly coordinated, persistent, major investment in… • Domain science communities (CI in service of R&D) • Specific application of CI to revolutionizing research (pilot -> operational) • Required not optional. New things, new ways. • New things, new ways. Empowerment, training, retraining. X-informatics. • Education and broader engagement • Multi-use: education, public science literacy • Equity of access

16. Investment Recommendations • Fundamental research relevant to CI (CI as object of R&D) 30 projects @ $2M = $60M • Base technology (CISE) • CI components & systems (CISE & SBE) • Science-driven pilots (CISE, all others) • Advanced application of CI in domain science (CI in service of R&D) $100M • Specific application of CI to revolutionizing research (pilot -> operational) • Required, not optional. • New things, new ways. Empowerment, training, retraining. X-informatics.

17. Investment Recommendations • Creating and evolving robust core components of operational CI $200M • Creating “production” software from research prototype software (a la NMI) • Operational support/services $660M • Distributed but connected (Grid) • Exploit commonality, interoperability • Advanced, leading-edge but… • Robust, predictable, responsive, persistent

18. Estimated annual budget, Millions of $/yr. Fund. and appl. research to advance CI $ 60 Research into applications of IT to advance $ 100 scientific and engineering research Acquisition and development of $ 200 cyberinfrastructure and applications Provisioning and operations of CI & apps $ 660 Computational centers $375 Data repositories $185 Digital libraries $ 30 Networking and connections $ 60 Application service centers $ 10 Total $1020

19. Bottom-line Recommendations • NSF leadership for the Nation of an initiative to revolutionize science and engineering research capitalizing on new computing and communications opportunities. • 21st Century Cyberinfrastructure includes supercomputing massive storage, networking, software, collaboration, visualization, and human resources • Current centers (NCSA, SDSC, PSC) and other programs are a key resource for the initiative.

20. Backups

22. Blue Ribbon Panel on CyberinfrastructurePresentation to MAGIC Paul Messina November 6, 2002

23. Overview of Talk • Disclaimer • Background, context • Findings and recommendations

24. From Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Speech to the Royal Society (23 May 2002) • What is particularly impressive is the way that scientists are now undaunted by important complex phenomena. Pulling together the massive power available from modern computers, the engineering capability to design and build enormously complex automated instruments to collect new data, with the weight of scientific understanding developed over the centuries, the frontiers of science have moved into a detailed understanding of complex phenomena ranging from the genome to our global climate. Predictive climate modelling covers the period to the end of this century and beyond, with our own Hadley Centre playing the leading role internationally. • The emerging field of e-science should transform this kind of work. It's significant that the UK is the first country to develop a national e-science Grid, which intends to make access to computing power, scientific data repositories and experimental facilities as easy as the Web makes access to information. • One of the pilot e-science projects is to develop a digital mammographic archive, together with an intelligent medical decision support system for breast cancer diagnosis and treatment. An individual hospital will not have supercomputing facilties, but through the Grid it could buy the time it needs. So the surgeon in the operating room will be able to pull up a high-resolution mammogram to identify exactly where the tumour can be found.

25. Streams of Activity Converging in a CI Initiative Collaboratories CI-enabled Science & Engineering Research & Education GRIDS (broadly defined) E-science Specific disciplinary projects (not using above labels)

26. Shared Opportunity and Responsibility • All NSF communities • Multi-agency • Industry • International

27. Basis for budget estimates • Our estimates are based on • current and previous NSF activities • testimonies • other agencies’ programs in related areas • activities in other countries • explicit input from community on Draft 1.0

28. Futures: The Computing Continuum Smart Objects Petabyte Archives Ubiquitous Sensor/actuator Networks National Petascale Systems Responsive Environments Collaboratories Terabit Networks Laboratory Terascale Systems Contextual Awareness Ubiquitous Infosphere Building Up Building Out Science, Policy and Education