An experimental cell-based system to investigate latency hiding methods

这是一个建议，以获得一个异构的计算集群测试床，包括一个头节点和四个计算节点。该集群基于最新发布的IBM Cell处理器，这是一个专门为图形和视频应用开发的多核高效计算引擎。头节点是基于IBM的双处理器刀片系统，而计算节点是SONY Playstation3，每个计算节点包括单个单元处理器。选择异构配置是因为索尼Playstation3的价格非常有利。该测试平台将用于研究和实现通信延迟隐藏技术，这将允许更好的应用程序扩展。此外，大型计算能力将用于开发一些化合物的生物活性神经网络模型（定量结构活性关系）。这些模型能够快速准确地探索化学品的制药潜力，从而减少新药开发所需的费用和时间。

This is a proposal to obtain a heterogeneous computational cluster testbed comprising a head node and four computational nodes. This cluster is based on the newly released IBM Cell processor, a multi-core highly efficient computational engine specifically developed to power graphics and video applications. The head node is a dual processor IBM-based blade system while the computational nodes are SONY Playstation3, each one comprising a single cell processor. The chosen heterogeneous configuration was chosen because of the very advantageous price of the SONY Playstation3. The testbed will be used to study and implement communications latency hiding techniques which will allow better application scaling. In addition, the large computational capabilities will be used in developing neural network-based models of biological activity for a number of chemical compounds (quantitative structure activity relationship). These models enable fast and accurate exploration of the pharmaceutical potential of  chemicals, reducing thus the expense and the time involved in the development of new pharmaceuticals.