Astronomy and Astrophysics Cluster in EGEE-III

1. Astronomy and Astrophysics Cluster in EGEE-III C. Vuerli (1,2), G. Taffoni (1,2), F. Pasian (1,2), M. Sponza (2), U. Becciani (3), S. Cassisi (4) (1) INAF – Information Systems Unit, (2) INAF – Osservatorio Astronomico di Trieste, (3) INAF – Osservatorio Astrofisico di Catania, (4) INAF – Osservatorio Astronomico di Teramo The A&A (Astronomy and Astrophysics) cluster in EGEE has been set up in January 2007. Its creation was strongly encouraged and supported by EGEE NA4 whose goal is to find new scientific communities and applications for EGEE. A&A has been immediately recognized as a key discipline for EGEE thanks to the success of two pilot astrophysical applications, Planck and MAGIC. After its creation the cluster grew in terms of users and applications. In EGEE-III some funds have been allocated to support disciplinary clusters in their activities; in this way it was possible to hire some man-power mainly dedicated to the application porting and to training activities. Many astrophysical Institutes and research groups are now part of the cluster. • Why an A&A cluster • Key objectives: • Enhance the number of applications ported on the EGEE Grid Infrastructure • Prepare the A&A community in view of the transition to EGI • Train new research groups in learning and using the Grid • Make the Grid and the Virtual Observatory fully interoperable • Benefit for EGEE: Astronomical applications are very challenging in requiring computing power, storage and additional non-standard services, so they are excellent test-beds for target Grid infrastructures • Benefit for EGEE: A&A Community can contribute to enhance the Grid capability with interesting use-cases • Benefit for A&A: Better performances for many astronomical applications when ported in Grid. • Benefit for A&A: Several groups already active in using the Grid can find in the new cluster the necessary support to do this in the best and most profitable way. • A&A VOs in EGEE • Two Astrophysical VOs are dedicated to the two pilot applications: Planck and Magic. • They were activated just after the approval of the applications. • These VOs are used for the purposes of the two projects. • An A&A generic VO was therefore added to support the creation of the A&A cluster. • The generic VO is intended to be used mainly by novice users who approach the Grid for the first time and wish to join the A&A cluster • A&A VOs are currently supported by all other VOs of EGEE. • Groups and Applications • Pilot applications “Planck” and “Magic” are in EGEE since 2004. • Since then the A&A cluster grew and now counts: • Five funded Institutes/Research Groups and nine unfunded located in eight different European countries. • About 23 applications: for some of them the gridification process terminated successfully; for others it is in progress just now. • Several training events have been organized to help A&A users to acquire expertise in Grid very quickly. • Future Perspectives • Despite the insufficient EGEE-III budget allocated to disciplinary clusters, several Institutes and research groups contribute to the A&A cluster in an unfunded way. • Other Institutes asked recently to join the cluster • There is therefore an increasing interest of the A&A community toward the Grid • EGI is a big opportunity to enforce the presence of A&A in the European Grid • All necessary steps to evolve the EGEE A&A cluster in an EGI SSC are in progress. Moving the current cluster to an EGI SSC is extremely important because in this way: • The astronomical community that uses the Grid technology does not disappear but continues to live in the EGI era. • An EGI SSC is a big opportunity to build an astronomical community in EGI with a clear structure and well organized • The European Astrophysics needs a SSC. Its presence in the European Grid is still too fragmented and potential users need to be further trained to: • Understand the big advantages of the Grid • Understand how they can port their applications in Grid in an efficient way • Realize that the Grid is a powerful mean to strengthen collaborations. Groups can create/join VOs and share resources within them. • More work is then necessary to make stable the presence of astrophysics in EGEE/EGI. A SSC allows to pursue and achieve this objective. • Structure • The cluster is currently managed by INAF • The subtasks that form the cluster work plan are listed below and reflect the main objectives established for the A&A cluster: • Management • Transition to EGI • Applications • Training and Dissemination • Interaction with Euro-VO