Data Center Core Consolidation

Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle WA

Investigators

Abstract

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant):This application proposes to create a new energy-efficient Data Center that will house, power, cool, network, and safeguard the rapidly expanding high-performance computing and data storage systems that are essential to the research of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center (servers and storage hardware are not part of this proposal). The proposed Data Center project is a critical renovation that will improve research productivity in virtually all research programs at the Hutchinson Center, an institution with more than 2800 employees, including 200 faculty and 400 trainees, who work to understand, treat, and prevent cancer and other human diseases. We are rapidly reaching a point when the burgeoning amount of research data generated by our scientists -- particularly those involved in data-intensive projects such as cancer genomics, genome-wide association studies, the application of proteomics to cell biology and discovery of early biomarkers of cancer, and mathematical modeling of epidemics and protein structure -- will exceed our capacity to cool and safeguard that data. To eliminate severe IT-infrastructure constraints on research, we propose a major alteration of 4,806 gsf to create a 389-kW consolidated Data Center. The new facility will increase the capacity of the Hutchinson Center data-center core facilities by more than 50% and consolidate six of nine current data- center spaces into a single Data Center. Modular design will permit expansion of data handling capacity to meet projected needs into 2017. Consolidation will greatly improve energy efficiency, operational efficiency and our ability to monitor the safety of research data. The state-of-the-art hot-air/cold-air separation design for the project maximizes cooling capacity, a current limitation in data-center capacity. The design also takes advantage of local temperate climate for additional energy savings. Auxiliary goals for the new Data Center are better space utilization and more efficient operational management. Furthermore, the new Data Center will enable disaster recovery of 1 Petabyte of data, which we project for FY2013, by creating a redundant storage infrastructure. The resulting increases in research capacity, throughput, and energy-efficiency provided by new Data Center will catalyze numerous Hutchinson Center research advances in cancer and other life-threatening diseases.