DATE: May 19, 2008

CONTACT: Jim Bottum, (864) 656-8100
jb@clemson.edu

CONTACT: Barbara Weaver, (864) 656-650-8238
weaver2@clemson.edu

WRITER: Tim Bowen, (864) 656-2800
tbowen@clemson.edu

WRITER: Teresa C. Hopkins, (864) 656-1222
hopkin1@clemson.edu

Clemson in spotlight for national cyberinfrastructure conference

CLEMSON – Clemson University is the focal point of a national conference on cyberinfrastructure (CI)  this week as hundreds of experts, faculty, staff and students gather at the Madren Conference Center for "CI Days." CI Days are part of a national forum designed to explore innovative ways to integrate information technology into teaching, research and outreach programs.

The participants are collaborating to raise awareness about cyberinfrastructure and spark collaboration across disciplines. Nearly 340 attendees include Clemson faculty, graduate students and IT staff along with colleagues from more than a dozen South Carolina universities and research centers.

“This important meeting on our campus will help faculty understand how recent improvements in our capabilities for high performance computing can impact and support scholarship, teaching, research and outreach across the disciplines,” said Clemson President James F. Barker.

Mark Lundstrom will deliver the keynote address on “Adventures in Cyberinfrastructure: Observations of an Accidental Tourist”  Tuesday. Lundstrom is the Scifres Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Purdue University and director of the National Science Foundation’s Network for Computational Nanotechnology.

“This is a unique opportunity for our faculty, graduate students and IT staff to share needs, ideas and projects with national and regional providers of CI resources and services to build working alliances that meet our educational needs and promote our collective missions,” said James Bottum, vice provost and chief information officer at Clemson.

The Clemson conference is sponsored by four university offices – Academic Affairs, Public Service Activities, Research and Economic Development, and Computing and Information Technology – and corporate partners that include Dell, Apple, SUN Microsystems and Cisco.

The effort also is supported by a national collaboration of computing and networking agencies including:

• Coalition for Networked Information (CNI)
• National Science Foundation (NSF)
• Department of Energy (DOE)
• Southeastern Universities Research Association (SURA)
• National LambdaRail (NLR)
• EDUCAUSE
• Internet2
• TeraGrid
• Open Science Grid (OSG)
• Renaissance Computing Institute (RENCI)
• International Research Network Connections (IRNC)

For more information on the conference and a schedule, go to http://cidays.clemson.edu.

Information on the national CI Days effort is available at www.cidays.org.