I-Corps: nanoHUB platform for STEM research, education, and collaboration

I-Corps项目的广泛影响/商业潜力是双重的：它降低了需要运行科学模拟的小型公司和初创公司的成本和知识障碍，并且通过允许更快，更集成地访问模拟工具和数据，它缩短了产品设计公司的上市时间。这个项目提供了一个端到端的、面向用户的云计算基础设施，它包含了所有三个关键涉众的需求：用户、模型/工具提供者和计算资源提供者。云模型已被证明是解决许多信息服务挑战的成本效益高、可靠的解决方案，基于云的科学模拟和计算平台有可能通过诱导科学模拟和数据使用方式的根本转变来影响高科技社区。小公司，尤其是新兴的初创公司，不需要投资于仿真软件，而是可以利用广泛的仿真生态系统进行产品设计。使用该平台的公司将较少受到本地计算资源的限制，并通过更大的仿真工具套件来解决设计问题，从而提高生产效率。I-Corps项目基于一个全面的基础设施，可以轻松托管和执行科学模拟，并存储和访问输出数据。在一个地方有多个可用的仿真代码，可以创建工作流，使用一个工具的输出为下一个工具提供输入。这种模块化方法使用户能够组合不同的工具并根据自己的需要定制工作流。模拟输出都被存储起来，由此产生的科学数据可以用来挖掘知识。用户的行为也被记录和分析，以增强用户体验。通过I-Corps内部的客户发现活动，以及从现有和潜在社区持续收集需求，这个基于云的模拟平台将有可能改变研究人员、学生、教育工作者和行业从业者在日常基础上与模拟和数据的互动方式。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is twofold: it lowers cost and knowledge barriers for smaller companies and startups which need to run scientific simulations, and it reduces time to market for product design firms by allowing faster, more integrated access to simulation tools and data. This project provides an end-to-end, user-oriented, cloud computing infrastructure that embraces the needs of all three critically involved stakeholders: users, model/tool providers, and computational resource providers. The cloud model has proved to be a cost effective, reliable solution to many information service challenges, and a cloud-based platform for scientific simulation and computation has the potential to impact the high-tech community by inducing a fundamental shift in the way scientific simulation and data are used. Small companies, especially emerging startups, need not invest in simulation software, but instead can utilize an extensive simulation ecosystem for product design. Companies with access to this platform will become less restricted by local computational resources, and more productive with a larger suite of simulation tools to solve design problems.This I-Corps project is based on a comprehensive infrastructure to host and execute scientific simulations and store and access the output data with ease. With multiple simulation codes available in one place, workflows can be created which use the output of one tool to provide input to the next. This modular approach enables users to combine different tools and customize the workflow to their own needs. Simulation outputs are all stored and the resulting scientific data can be mined for knowledge. User actions are also recorded and analyzed to enhance the user experience. Through customer discovery activities within I-Corps and continued requirements gathering from existing and potential communities, this cloud-based simulation platform will potentially change how researchers, students, educators, and industry practitioners engage with simulation and data on a day-to-day basis.