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2011 editorial and media releases
BlueFern HPC Grand Challenge in association with NeSI (December)
Microsoft NZ renews its partnership with the University of Canterbury and NZi3 for a second year (November)
NEC New Zealand joins as first NZi3 Research Sponsor (October)
New Zealand researchers are invited to apply for the BlueFern High Performance Computing (HPC) Grand Challenge 2011. BlueFern, in association with NeSI, is making available four million core hours worth of allocations, and challenges New Zealand Researchers to scale up their HPC codes and tackle some of the largest scientific problems in areas such as biochemistry, climate simulation, machine intelligence, molecular dynamics, etc.
There are two categories in this year's challenge:
| Deadline: | 20th December 2011 |
| Number of Awards: | 2 |
| Award: | 1,000,000 core hours |
| Machine allocation: | BlueGene/L |
| Criterion: | the principal investigator must have completed their PhD less than 5 years ago |
| Deadline: | 31st January 2012 |
| Number of Awards: | 1 |
| Award: | 2,000,000 core hours |
| Machine allocation: | BlueGene/P |
| Criterion: | open to all researchers within New Zealand Institutions |
To find out more or how to apply visit the BlueFern website
Microsoft New Zealand has announced the renewal of its public private partnership with the University of Canterbury and NZi3 (New Zealand ICT Innovation Institute) for a second year and has increased the length and number of Microsoft New Zealand Research Internship Awards on offer at the University.
“We are delighted that Microsoft has renewed its partnership with the University of Canterbury and reinforced its belief in the need for a world-class educational centre of excellence in the region,” said University of Canterbury Vice-Chancellor, Dr Rod Carr. “We are committed to providing UC students with opportunities for work-related experiences as part of their undergraduate degree programme. Successfully participating in internships with companies such as Microsoft is a means by which UC graduates can establish themselves as ready for the global marketplace where they will make their mark as future professionals.”
Paul Muckleston, Managing Director of Microsoft New Zealand, said Microsoft was committed to helping students and education providers reach their full potential. During his visit, Paul also met with Stephen Fitchett, the first recipient of the Microsoft NZ Research Internship Award launched last year.
Stephen spent two and a half months working at the Microsoft Asia Research Labs in Beijing, with Stephen’s research mentor in Beijing describing him as the most capable intern he has worked with during his time at the lab. “Stephen has completed a first-class internship and his two and a half-month project is set to have a great impact,” said Dr Darren Edge of Microsoft Research in Beijing. “Stephen should be proud of the work he has done here and I am confident that Stephen has a very successful research career ahead of him". Stephen travelled to the UIST conference (User Interface Software Technology) in Santa Barbara, California in October 2011 as part of the Microsoft NZ Research Intern Award.
This year the Microsoft NZ Research Internship Award recipients will be hosted in Washington at the Redmond Research Lab. The lab hosts researchers from around the world including Cambridge, England; Beijing, China; and San Francisco, California who come to collaborate closely with teams and other researchers on site. The Microsoft New Zealand Research Internship Awards have been extended to accommodate two successful UC applicants for three to six month internships. Applications for the Microsoft NZ Research Internship Awards open tomorrow (30 November 2011).
NEC New Zealand Ltd (NEC New Zealand) announces today its collaboration for research as a Research Sponsor with the New Zealand ICT Innovation Institute (NZi3) based at the University of Canterbury, the first of such an engagement at this level for NZi3. Initial collaboration between the two institutes will focus on energy and ecology solutions to help rebuild the City of Christchurch after the massive earthquakes, as well as human interaction solutions such as biometrics and robotics.
NZi3 is a ‘hothouse’ of strategic ICT research and aims to be a globally-recognized innovation centre that transforms ideas from the lab, across the innovation gap, into industry. NEC New Zealand is the local subsidiary of NEC Corporation in New Zealand, with offices in Wellington and Auckland to provide the latest technologies and total solutions to the New Zealand market. This collaboration aims to unite world-class researchers and research students from the University of Canterbury with industry experts from NEC, to co-develop new and innovative technologies and solutions and transform these ideas into relevant applications for the market.
As part of this collaboration, NEC New Zealand will provide a sponsorship of NZ$90,000 over three years, in addition to the equipment and other in-kind support worth more than NZ$30,000 during the same period. This sponsorship also includes the funding of two full-time postgraduate research students whose thesis research will be guided and supervised by NEC and based in NZi3. Furthermore, NEC will promote and feature the collaborative demonstrations with NZi3 at its Innovation Centre showroom.
Rod Carr, Vice Chancellor of the University of Canterbury says, “We are delighted to be establishing this new partnership with NEC and NZi3. Innovation is at the forefront of our practice as a University and building industry relationships such as this is vital to our future.”
Hamish House, Director of NZi3 says, “NZi3 is incredibly excited to be working with NEC in this new and exhilarating partnership. By bringing together a multinational company with over 100 years of expertise in technological innovation with the University’s world class expertise in ICT research and academia, bright young and talented post-graduate students are given the opportunity to work with one of the world best companies. Students and researchers will be working side by side in collaboration to co-develop new and ground breaking innovative technologies and solutions and transform these ideas into relevant applications for the global market place. We look forward to the first three years of this partnership delivering exciting new developments and value for NZi3, the University and NEC.”
Leonard Dench, General Manager at NEC New Zealand says, “NEC New Zealand is thrilled to work with NZi3, a leading ICT research institute in New Zealand and this collaboration is part of our corporate strategy to leverage our research and development capabilities. There are abundant research opportunities that could be explored between the two institutes and we hope to bring to market some of our new and exciting developments and technologies soon.”