Advanced Research Computing – Technology Services (ARC-TS) is starting the process of creating a new, campus-wide computing cluster, “Great Lakes,” that will serve the broad needs of researchers across the University. Over time, Great Lakes will replace Flux, the shared research computing cluster that currently serves over 300 research projects and 2,500 active users.
The Great Lakes cluster will be available to all researchers on campus for simulation, modeling, machine learning, data science, genomics, and more. The platform will provide a balanced combination of computing power, I/O performance, storage capability, and accelerators.
ARC-TS is in the process of procuring the cluster. A “Beta” cluster will be available to help researchers learn the new system before Great Lakes is deployed in the first half of 2019.
Based on extensive input from faculty and other stakeholders across campus, the new Great Lakes cluster will be designed to deliver similar services and capabilities as Flux, including the ability to accommodate faculty purchases of hardware (as in the current Flux Operating Environment service), access to GPUs and large-memory nodes, and improved support for emerging uses such as machine learning and genomics. Great Lakes will consist of approximately 20,000 cores.
For technical support, please email hpc-support@umich.edu.
