The "computer ranch" at the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research (SFBR), one of the world's largest clusters of computers for human gene research, will more than double in size this summer, thanks to a $2 million federal grant that will speed the pace of discovery at the Foundation's AT&T Genomics Computing Center.
“Our expansion will provide us with sufficient computational firepower to handle the coming flood of whole human genome sequencing, which will become cost-effective in the next one to two years”
The grant will fund the manufacture and installation of 5,004 more linked processors for the computing center. That will give the Foundation a total of 8,004 linked computers that can work in tandem to process the billions of calculations required for complex genetic analyses. Installation of the processors should begin in August and be completed by the middle of September. M&A Technology Inc. of Carrollton, Texas, will manufacture, install and maintain the specialized processors.
The investment will more than double the center's computing power and provide a 20-fold increase in data storage capacity, said John Blangero, Ph.D., a statistical geneticist and director of the computing center.
Until recently, cost and technological limits meant that scientists had to focus any study on a narrow segment of the genome. The field is advancing rapidly, though, and soon computational geneticists will be able to undertake complete genome sequencing of individual subjects in their studies, said Blangero.
"Our expansion will provide us with sufficient computational firepower to handle the coming flood of whole human genome sequencing, which will become cost-effective in the next one to two years," Blangero said. "This investment will keep the Foundation at the forefront of the expanding genetic frontier."
Funding for the expansion comes through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, part of the economic stimulus package approved by Congress in 2009. It provided money to the National Center for Research Resources, a part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), to make awards for scientific equipment investments at research institutions across the country.
The computers support $110 million worth of NIH grants, giving the Foundation a compelling case in favor of the additional federal investment, said Blangero. Foundation scientists are directing or supporting a number of studies that employ extended family pedigrees to track down the genetic basis of heart disease, diabetes, obesity, psychiatric illnesses and brain structure.
SOURCE Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research
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