Representatives from IBM hosted a Symposium at Vanderbilt on January 10, 2006 to discuss research that is utilizing IBM's Blue Gene Server solutions.
During the Symposium, the following presentations were made:
- Accelerating breakthrough science with IBM Servers Blue Gene Solution, Ralph E. Warmack, PhD and Rajiv D. Bendale, PhD
- Life Sciences Research at IBM, Ajay K. Royyuru
For additional information, you may refer to the following:
- Blue Gene Brochure
- Business Case for IBM eServer Blue Gene Systems
- Scaling Physics and Material Science Applications on a Massively Parallel Blue Gene/L System
- Early Experience with Scientific Applications on the Blue Gene/L Supercomputer
- Porting Applications to the IBM eServer Blue Gene/L System Solution
Presenters
Rajiv D. Bendale, Ph.D.
Americas Group Leader for BlueGene Systems
Rajiv D. Bendale is responsible for the BlueGene/L sales development in all business sectors in North and South America. Prior to joining the IBM Deep Computing Sales Group, Rajiv D. Bendale served with the IBM Healthcare and Life Sciences organization from November 2000 to March 2005, as a Senior Solutions Specialist.
Prior to joining IBM, Rajiv D. Bendale was the Director of Scientific Support at Hypercube, Inc. from 1998 through October 2000. Prior to joining Hypercube Inc., Dr. Bendale was a Research Associate with the department of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Florida (1995-1998) where he worked on implementing Molecular Dynamics and Hybrid Monte Carlo methods to study fracture in glasses, simulation of grain growth and high temperature creep in silicon carbide. He also worked on the simulation of the structure and spectroscopy of rare earth doped laser host materials in collaboration with Sandia National Labs. In 1994 he served as a visiting research scientist at the Advanced Materials Research Center at the University of Florida, where he worked on Quantum Chemical calculations on silicate clusters, transition metal ions in sol-gel matrix and fracture in amorphous silica.
Dr. Bendale was a Research Associate at the Quantum Theory Project at the University of Florida (1989-1993) where he focused on the development of geometry optimization methods, semi-empirical methods, studies on electronic structure and properties of Fullerenes and transition metal clusters, catalysis in model bio-molecules. He is one of the authors of the ZINDO program and was responsible for commercializing the program.
Ralph E. Warmack, Ph.D.
Principal, BlueGene System Solutions, Engineering & Technology Services
Dr. Ralph Warmack is Worldwide Principal for eServer BlueGene System Solutions offered by IBM's Engineering & Technology Services. Prior to his current assignment, he led the Linux and Grid deployment revolution among IBM's customers in the Electronics, Automotive, Aerospace & Defense, and Chemicals & Petroleum industries. Previously, he managed sales and marketing activities for IBM Microelectronics and contributed to IBM's business transformation and development of ibm.com. Before joining IBM, Dr. Warmack held management, marketing, engineering and research positions at VLSI Technology, Tandy, Amoco and Atlantic Richfield. He holds BS, MS, and PhD degrees in Electrical Engineering, and is a Senior Member of the IEEE and a Registered Professional Engineer.
Ajay Royyuru, Ph.D.
IBM Research Senior Manager, Computational Biology Center
Ajay Royyuru heads the Computational Biology Center at IBM Research, where he leads 35 researchers in projects that include bioinformatics, structural biology, protein science and applications on Blue Gene, functional genomics and systems biology.
Ajay obtained his Ph.D. in molecular biology from the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai in 1993 and then did post-doctoral work in structural biology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York. Prior to joining IBM in 1998, he spent two years developing structural biology software at Accelrys. His current research interests include understanding sequence-structure-function relationships in proteins and he is actively involved in protein structure prediction, protein folding and structural genomics. Ajay has over 30 research publications in structural and computational biology.
David A. Kra
IT Architect for GRID, Cooperative, and Distributed Systems
Mr. Kra has 28 years of experience with senior customer executives and technical personnel designing, proposing, and implementing mission-critical solutions, using grid, e-business, and network based, client / server, cooperative, distributed, transaction and communications technologies.
Mr. Kra has taught, published, presented at conferences, and filed for his first patent. He is a member of IBM's Academy of Technology. He sits on IBM's IT Architect and Senior Consulting IT Architect certification boards.
Mr. Kra earned his MSE in Electrical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania and his BS in Engineering from Yale University after graduating from the Boston Latin School. Besides continual technical, product and professional training within IBM, Mr. Kra completed IBM's Systems Research Institute. He is a member of the Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society.
