High Performance Computing
Overview
The Research Computing Centre manages central High Performance Computing resources at UQ.
Central HPC facilities at UQ currently comprise the Bunya and Wiener clusters.
Note that HPCs Awoonga, FlashLite and Tinaroo were decommissioned in March 2022, January 2023 and March 2023 respectively as they had reached end-of-life status. If you were previously using either of these HPCs, please check our Bunya and Wiener webpages about how to access those HPCs, or email the RCC Support Desk for guidance: rcc-support@uq.edu.au.
HPC Accounts
UQ staff and research students are entitled to free HPC accounts but need to apply.
To open an HPC account for research, UQ staff and students should do the following:
- Register for a QRIScloud account if they do not already have one (register at QRIScloud).
- Request a cluster-specific service, i.e. Bunya or Wiener. (See the Bunya and Wiener webpages for further information about getting an account.)
Once your account has been created, your access details for HPC will be confirmed via email.
For any other support requests, please contact the RCC Support Desk: rcc-support@uq.edu.au.
Training
UQ staff and research students may want to attend a training session to familiarise themselves with UQ's HPC environment. Training is provided monthly, and researchers are welcome to consult with the RCC’s HPC staff about their projects — just email: rcc-support@uq.edu.au.
Advanced Computing Strategy
In 2013, the Research Computing Centre developed a strategy of broadening the infrastructure base for supporting computational research at UQ. This strategy is built on the belief that it is more cost effective to partition the application space into niches and serve these by different machines. These are:
- Very large tightly-coupled parallel jobs that support NCG funded research
- Loosely-coupled high throughput jobs
- Accelerated computing platforms.
Very large tightly coupled parallel jobs that support NCG funded research
National Computational Infrastructure (NCI) at the Australian National University (ANU) best serves these jobs. NCI operates a 3,200-node supercomputer called Gadi, that entered production in late 2019.
UQ is currently guaranteed more than 25 million service units (2 service units = 1 core hour) for 2021 on Gadi, through a dedicated ARC-LIEF grant, and nearly 6 million service units from a dedicated QCIF allocation in addition to anything gained through the National Computational Merit Allocation Scheme. The service units from the UQ-LIEF and QCIF share are allocated by RCC and QCIF.
Loosely-coupled high throughput jobs
The ARDC Nectar Research Cloud is an ideal platform for running loosely coupled jobs.
QCIF operates the Queensland node of the Nectar Research Cloud. The Queensland node is called QRIScloud, and its main data centre is located at the Polaris Data Centre in Springfield, Brisbane.
Accelerated computing platforms
Wiener is specifically for imaging-intensive science, generated by UQ’s world-leading microscopy facilities. It provides near real-time outputs of deconvolved, tagged and appropriately characterised imaging data. Wiener, launched in early 2018, will support UQ’s new world-class IMB-based Lattice Light Sheet Microscope.
Wiener was developed with strategic funding from UQ and a consortium of the university’s various cutting-edge microscopy facilities housed within the Centre for Microscopy and Microanalysis (CMM), Institute for Molecular Bioscience (IMB), and Queensland Brain Institute (QBI).