E-science, supercomputing, and grid
The future of the Netherlands is inextricably linked to opportunities for developing and applying knowledge. The government’s key economic sectors policy focuses on collaboration between the commercial sector, knowledge institutions, and government. ICT links the various key sectors, and is seen as an important basis for innovation. Here too, SURF can play a role.
National ICT research infrastructure
Outstanding research generates ever-larger quantities of data. In 2012, SURF received systematic funding from the Dutch government to create a national ICT research infrastructure. In the years ahead, SURF’s focus will be on constructing that infrastructure, which will consist of networks, supercomputers, grids, and data. This will be carried out by
SURFnet,
SARA and
eScience Center.
Knowledge transfer to the commercial sector
Being able to apply the knowledge generated by outstanding research is an important factor in reinforcing our position on the knowledge front. SURF aims to contribute to the transfer of knowledge to the commercial sector. This takes place as part of a close relationship with the Netherlands eScience Center and will in future also involve collaboration with SARA.
Netherlands eScience Center
The
Netherlands eScience Centre is a joint initiative of SURF and NWO. Its aim is to support and reinforce multidisciplinary and data-intensive scientific research in the Netherlands and to encourage the innovative use of ICT in research.
SARA
In order to combine the national ICT facilities for research, it has been decided that
SARA should be incorporated into SURF. SARA will be integrated as an independent division within the SURF organisation, and will continue to concern itself with the infrastructure and services in the field of high-performance computing and visualisation. SARA provides large-scale computing capacity, an integrated ICT infrastructure, and support for researchers. It also focuses on the cloud and associated developments, advanced and large-scale data storage, and the basic facilities for eScience.