WESTBOROUGH, Mass. – Today, the Healey-Driscoll Administration announced a $1.3 million, two-year grant to Boston University to expand and improve the capabilities of the New England Research Cloud (NERC). NERC serves as a collaborative, world-class cloud computing service housed at the Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center (MGHPCC) in Holyoke.
The new grant will expand cloud computing services at the NERC through the installation of new networking and storage infrastructure. The project, awarded through the state’s Tech and Innovation Ecosystem Grant Program at the Innovation Institute at MassTech, will utilize over 1,600 servers donated by Boston-based online retailer Wayfair. BU and Harvard University will manage the project and the development of software and systems to equitably engage researchers and institutions for use of advanced computing services.
The state’s investment of capital funds will allow the NERC to rapidly employ the donated servers, allowing the partnership to scale its production services tenfold and increase the ability of researchers to use cloud computing services. The funding also includes $150,000 in operational support to accelerate the adoption of NERC services by regional institutions.
“Massachusetts is committed to building a strong foundation for research and data-driven discovery by investing in collaborative tools that make it easier to share information and innovate,” said Yvonne Hao, Secretary of Economic Development Yvonne Hao. “This grant will increase access to research tools for a new generation of STEM leaders and provide industry, academia, and the public sector with the proper infrastructure to connect, share ideas, and explore new avenues to advance their research through the added cloud computing power.”
“Innovation is more likely when you put in place the right tools so experts can work together,” said Pat Larkin, Director of the Innovation Institute. “NERC has demonstrated a firm commitment to building strong relationships across the region, and we are proud to have supported their organizational capacity through this effort. With this increase in computing power at the NERC, we can build more and innovate faster than ever, helping bolster the Massachusetts advanced computing cluster.”
Currently, the NERC and MGHPCC are working with the open-source community to develop innovative cloud services and technologies for researchers. In 2021, Red Hat committed $20 million over 5 years to the Hariri Institute for Computing and Computational Science and Engineering at Boston University for the creation of the Red Hat Collaboratory, a unique partnership that “connects BU faculty and students with industry practitioners working in open-source software communities.”
Through efforts like the Collaboratory, the NERC is made available to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, such as social innovation hackathons, Greater Boston Research Opportunities for Young Women (GROW), and other programs that engage those underrepresented in STEM fields.
The current grant builds upon the $875,000 grant that was awarded to the NERC in 2020 through the Collaborative Research & Development Matching Grant Program. These funds supported the creation of a pilot program that established new cloud architecture to conduct research across various disciplines. That project went live in fall 2022, helping boost research in a wide array of disciplines including data science, physical sciences, life sciences, social sciences, earth sciences, public health, and medicine.
The Tech and Innovation Ecosystem Grant Program seeks to strengthen technology and innovation in regions across the Commonwealth through support for projects or initiatives that contribute to a competitive advantage for existing and emerging industry clusters across Massachusetts. The program aims to improve conditions overall for job growth, drive business expansion and new business formation, and impact other indicators of growth in the innovation economy such as capital formation, increased export products and services, improved labor pools, and increased wages.
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About the Innovation Institute at the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative (MassTech)
The MassTech Collaborative is a quasi-public economic development agency that strengthens the competitiveness of the tech and innovation economy by driving strategic investments, partnerships, and insights that harness the talent of Massachusetts. The Innovation Institute is the division of MassTech that advances a core mission of innovation and cluster growth across the Commonwealth. Created in 2003, the Innovation Institute intervenes in the economy in the following four ways:
- Conducts research and analysis that improves the state’s understandings of unmet needs and opportunities in the innovation economy;
- Serves as convener and key strategic broker within various sectors;
- Manages high-value projects on behalf of the Commonwealth; and
- Makes strategic investments in support of innovation-based economic development.
For more information, visit https://innovation.masstech.org/.