CC* Compute: A Hybrid Cloud Environment for the Rocky Mountain Advanced Computing Consortium

University Of Colorado At Boulder, Boulder CO

Investigators

Abstract

The Research Computing group at the University of Colorado Boulder provides a hybrid cloud infrastructure to support computing, data, and science gateway needs that are currently not met by the existing high-performance and high-throughput computing infrastructure. The system is also integrated into the Open Science Grid (OSG) to enable full utilization of the deployed on-premise hardware using otherwise idle compute capacity. The hybrid cloud system provides one integrated system view of the on-premise and public cloud to researchers so they can select the right resource to support their work. This new capability eases the burden of finding appropriate computational tools for their work, allowing researchers to focus on new discoveries and the advancement of their fields. Major emphasis areas of the research supported are in the geosciences, hydrological modeling, natural language processing, machine learning, and earth analytics. Members of the Rocky Mountain Advanced Computing Consortium (RMACC) have access to 20% of the provided cloud resources with a focus on smaller institutions. This hybrid cloud provides: virtual machines either from a library or customized by the researcher; execution and orchestration of containers; serverless computing; and hosting for persistent science gateways and other science services. This project heavily leverages the NSF award #1659425 "CC* Cyber Team: Creating a Community of Regional Data and Workflow Cyberinfrastructure Facilitators" by reusing training materials on containerization and capitalizing on relationships established during focus groups and one-on-one consults. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.