Bulletin 194 - 2009 November 5

1. NCI - Call for Applications to the Merit Allocations Scheme

1. NCI - Call for Applications to the Merit Allocations Scheme

The Merit Allocation Scheme (MAS) of National Computational Infrastructure (NCI, http://www.nci.org.au) provides Australian researchers with access to world-class high-end computing services.

All CSIRO and CAWCR staff (including BoM) are eligible to apply for MAS grants in addition to accessing the NCI partner share provided through CSIRO and the HPCCC.

This call seeks applications from researchers in universities and publicly funded research organisations (covered by the NCRIS Capabilities) for computational resources (processor time and related data storage) on the NCI National Facility (http://nf.nci.org.au). Under the MAS, resources are allocated to researchers on merit through a process which assesses applications on their research quality and computational requirements and needs.

In 2010, the facilities that will be available are:

• The new peak system - a Sun Constellation Cluster (vayu) with 11936 cores.
• The SGI Altix XE 1300 (xe) with 1248 cores.

Access under the MAS is provided for by Commonwealth (NCRIS) funding and thus researchers provided with resources under this scheme are not charged by NCI for the services provided. For 2010, the value of these resources is approximately $0.12 per core hour, an amount which can be stated as an in-kind contribution to research granting bodies (e.g., ARC, NHMRC).

The closing date for applications is Monday, November 9.

All applications are completed online using a form which is available at http://nf.nci.org.au/accounts/.

More information is available at http://nf.nci.org.au/accounts/call_for_applications.php

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