Supercomputers Key To Competitiveness

More than a year ago, we featured a major initiative taking place on several college campuses across Arkansas.  The Arkansas Research and Education Optical Network, ARE•ON for short, was a critical project aimed at enhancing research competitiveness and cooperation for Arkansas universities with other peers around the world.

Michael Tilley with our content partner, The City Wire, has a follow-up on this interconnective project.

On Monday (Jan. 24), the Arkansas High Performance Computing Center at the University of Arkansas said recent research highlights the direct correlation between research competitiveness and supercomputer access.

The Arkansas High Performance Computing Center supports research in computer science, integrated nanoscience, computational chemistry, computational biomagnetics, materials science and spatial science.

“Overall, our models indicated that investment in high-performance computing is a good predictor of research competitiveness at U.S. academic institutions,” said Amy Apon, director of the Arkansas High Performance Computing Center. “Even at modest levels, such investments, if consistent from year to year, strongly correlate to new NSF funding for science and engineering research, which in turn leads to more published articles.”

Tilley notes that last year’s announcement that the University of Arkansas System would receive a $102 million grant to expand broadband access in the state is a big boost to this cause.

You can read more on the subject and its potential repercussions at this link.