CSIRO has hired RCC systems administrator Derek Benson as a scientific workflow specialist.
Derek joined CSIRO’s 100-plus scientific computing team as a Technical Solutions Workflow Specialist on Monday, 6 May, based at the Queensland Centre for Advanced Technologies in Pullenvale, Brisbane.
His new job involves managing CSIRO's Galaxy server and implementing and developing scientific workflows for a broad range of research applications, from agriculture to astrophysics, and assisting scientists to run workflows on CSIRO’s high-performance computers.
Previously, Derek had worked at RCC since January 2014 as a systems administrator on the Galaxy Virtual Laboratory project. He played a central role in establishing the national Galaxy Australia service, a Web-based platform for accessible, reproducible and transparent bioinformatics analysis that all Australian researchers can access.
“With the help of [RCC’s] Dr Igor Makunin and others, we have steadily grown Galaxy Australia to the point where last month we ran over 45,000 jobs [i.e. units of work on the server]” said Derek. This is a steady increase of thousands of jobs per month since Galaxy went national in early 2018.
“I have worked with individual scientists over the last few years to assist them in their use of Galaxy in projects covering cancer research and tuberculosis research.”
Recent upgrades to Galaxy Australia, including data storage expansion, have strengthened the service to handle growth in the coming year. “So, I feel as a systems administrator I'm leaving it in the best possible condition,” said Derek.
Galaxy Australia will continue to be operated and managed by a team including RCC’s Dr Igor Makunin and QCIF’s Dr Gareth Price.
“Derek has been a fantastic asset to the Galaxy Australia team, and was very approachable and never too fazed by the demands of being systems administrator for a national service. Galaxy Australia looks forward to working with Derek in his new CSIRO Galaxy role,” said Galaxy Australia Service Manager Dr Gareth Price.
