High performance computing is rapidly transitioning from being compute-centric to being data-centric. The members of the Storage Systems for Extreme Computing (SSEC) group perform research and development to improve the management and handling of large scale data in high performance computing clusters. The group focuses on block and file level storage, investigating improvements applicable to parallel file systems as well as proposing architectures and protocols to scale data capacity and bandwidth.

The current objectives of the research group are:

  • Investigate new storage abstractions to organise and store data better suited for Exascale and Big-data challenges.
  • Implement production-quality middleware solutions to mitigate the Exascale and Big-data problems.
  • Evaluate the potential of virtualisation to improve both efficiency and usability of storage systems.
  • Research the modelling of data-centric workflows to optimize HPC storage allocation and usage.
  • Develop composable platforms that allow configuring specialized file systems that improve the I/O of HPC applications.
  • Investigate the integration of new storage technologies such as non-volatile memories into the HPC storage stack.

Currently, our research revolves around two main software developments: GekkoFS, a user-level ephemeral file system that runs alongside a HPC application and can be specialized for its I/O semantics; and NORNS, an asynchronous data staging service that collaborates with Slurm to enable data-driven workflows in HPC clusters.

The research line has been integrated inside the Data Centric Computing group, under the lead of Dr Ramon Nou.

Partners

Our work is primarily funded by European research projects funded by the European Commission and national projects funded by Spain’s Ministry of Science and Innovation. Currently, our research relies on funds from PID2019-107255GB, and the list of the group’s previously awarded can be seen in the projects page. In addition to our research collaborators, we are also affiliated with:

Johannes Gutenberg Universität Mainz Universidad Carlos III EPCC

Contact

Ramon Nou
Research Group Leader
Campus Nord - K2M Building, Office 003
Jordi Girona, 1-3 08034 Barcelona
ramon.nou (#!) bsc.es
Alberto Miranda
Research Group Co-leader
Campus Nord - K2M Building, Office 003
Jordi Girona, 1-3 08034 Barcelona
alberto.miranda (#!) bsc.es