MRI Acquisition: A Reconfigurable Computing Infrastructure Enabling Interdisciplinary and Collaborative Research in Hampton Roads

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This project acquires a reconfigurable computing system that wiil support a broad spectrum of research projects in an appropriately tailored computer environment using state-of the-art technologies. It offers substantial computational power to support a number of critical research initiatives at the institution.This infrastructure, named DISCOVER, enables big data and high-performance computing research. Three key thrusts are emphasized: Cybersecurity, Resilience, and Data Intensive Science and Engineering. Each thrust includes multiple applications, as follows. Cybersecurity: hardware security for cryptographic circuit verification; modeling learning with homomorphic encryption; malware and anomaly detection; and modeling cyber-attack paths and their mitigation.Resilience: computational simulations to model sea level rise; understanding social media for emergency preparedness for natural disasters; and data-driven understanding of massive geospatial traffic patterns.Data Intensive Science and Engineering: high-accuracy finite element mesh generation; analysis of brain imaging and image-guided surgery; and modelling of power-consumption and resource allocation for high-performance computing clusters.The acquired computing system will stimulate multi-disciplinary collaborations with other institutions in Hampton Roads, including Norfolk State University, Tidewater Community College, and Thomas Nelson Community College. Training workshops and a summer institute will be organized to help students in various research fields to gain high-performance computing skills. The insitution will leverage the National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education (NICE) framework to address cyber workforce needs by increasing the pipeline of students pursuing cybersecurity careers.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.