Showing posts with label Center. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Center. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
New opportunity awaits Nuggets center Timofey...
Five people were killed when a rockslide buried them Monday, September 30, 2013, at a ...
Sorry, I could not read the content fromt this page.Monday, September 30, 2013
Sunday, June 9, 2013
Simons Center for the Social Brain offering seed grants, postdoc fellowships
The Simons Center for the Social Brain (SCSB) at MIT is pleased to announce its 2013 Round 1 funding opportunities for faculty seed grants and postdoctoral fellowships. The deadline for applications is Feb. 28, 2013.
Mission and goals
The mission of the Simons Center for the Social Brain is to understand the neural mechanisms underlying social cognition and behavior, and to translate this knowledge into better diagnosis and treatment of autism spectrum disorders.
Neural correlates of social cognition and behavior exist in diverse species, and the underlying mechanisms will be studied in both humans and relevant model organisms and systems. We expect that experimental approaches will take advantage of strengths at MIT in genetics and genomics, molecular and cell biology, analyses of neural circuits and systems, cognitive psychology, mathematics and engineering.
Seed grants
MIT faculty members with an interest in autism research may apply as the PI on a seed research grant. We seek innovative research projects that are directly relevant to autism and that bridge at least two different MIT labs, or one MIT lab and another at a Boston-area institution (typically a hospital). The expectation is that the seed funds will enable the collection of pilot data on bold new projects, bringing the work to the point where it can be funded through standard channels after the first year. This mechanism will provide a single year of support, at a maximum level of $100,000 in direct costs (indirect costs need not be included in the budget).
The project must involve one MIT faculty member as PI and at least one other independent researcher as co-PI from a different lab. When a MIT PI applies with a co-PI from another Boston-area institution, the funds will be budgeted for spending at MIT. Successful applicants can apply later for a second year of funding, but the application will be considered in competition with all submitted applications (including new ones).?
Postdoctoral Fellowships
Applications for postdoctoral fellowships (named Simons Postdoctoral Fellowships) are sought from candidates with PhD or MD degrees who aim to conduct research at MIT that is relevant to autism. These prestigious fellowships are open to candidates nationwide. They are designed to enhance and showcase autism research at MIT and will be awarded to candidates who propose innovative research bridging at least two different labs.
Each postdoctoral applicant must have a primary advisor who is a MIT faculty member, and a secondary advisor who is an independent researcher at another MIT lab or Boston-area institution. While the fellowships are open to candidates currently at MIT, our goal is to attract outstanding external candidates. MIT faculty members are encouraged to bring these fellowships to the attention of exceptional candidates who wish to come to MIT for postdoctoral training as Simons Fellows.?
The Simons Postdoctoral Fellowships will provide a competitive stipend plus an allowance for health insurance, travel and research-related expenses. The fellowships will be awarded for 2 years, conditional upon satisfactory progress at the end of the first year.?
For information on how to apply for either seed grants or postdoctoral fellowships, please visit the SCSB website. 
Saturday, June 8, 2013
Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager 2007 SP2, R2, R3: Making Sense of the Three Versions
Microsoft has engaged in a continual process of upgrading, enhancing, and improving its System Center Configuration Management server since its release several years ago. At this point, organizations who plan to use the product for Operating System Deployment must seriously consider an upgrade to Service Pack 2, or they lose the ability to support Windows 7 workstations. Service Pack 2 is also a necessity for the organization wishing to take full advantage of Out of Band Management.
The fourth edition of Microsoft's System Management Server was released in August, 2007 with a new name, System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM), making it part of the System Center brand, along with a considerable package of enhancements extending the SMS 2003 product. Since the initial release of SCCM, there have been two service packs, an R2 version, and the beta version of R3. Keeping track of which iteration is necessary for which feature is a daunting task that has been complicated by the R3's continued beta status and the v.Next product that has been demonstrated at Microsoft's MMS and TechEd events. In this white paper, we will go through the components of each variety of the product that is often called ConfigMgr in an effort to clear up the confusion around this very valuable piece of management software.
In broad strokes, SMS and its re-named child provide an enterprise with the ability to centrally deploy applications and operating systems, inventory software and hardware, manage the distribution of updates and patches, and permit the reporting of each of those crucial components. As a replacement for SMS 2003, SCCM 2007 brought with it several brand-new features including Desired Configuration Management, Wake on LAN, and Network Access Protection.
Desired Configuration Management (DCM) provided an organization with the ability to analyze and compare their existing computers against a previously created standard. Wake on LAN allowed the deployment of applications and patches to a machine that is a low power state. Network Access Protection permits an organization to exclude non-compliant machines from gaining access to the network.
Additionally, a significant number of capabilities that had been introduced as Feature Packs in SMS 2003 were now included in the SCCM 2007 standard deployment, including Operating System Deployment, Asset Intelligence, and Mobile Device Management. In many ways, SCCM 2007 was the natural progression of a solid and mature product. The new and enhanced capabilities made a good business case for an upgrade for SMS 2003 users and for the adoption of the product for those using other tools or were attempting to gain a better grasp of their environment.
In May of 2008, the first Service Pack of SCCM 2007 was released. It provided some new features such as Out of Band Management, support for Soft Grid (now App-V) applications, as well as enhancements to Asset Intelligence and license management capabilities. By introducing the entirely new Out of Band Management capability, which allowed for the control of systems that were powered off or in a low power state, Microsoft signaled that it would continue its strategy of adding significant components to the ConfigMgr product through the interim service packs and releases.
At the end of August 2008, Microsoft released the R2 version of ConfigMgr 2007 to market. As a new "version," it was made available without additional cost to SCCM customers who participated in the Software Assurance program. Release 2 came with an updated help file, which continues to prove quite useful, in addition to new capabilities previously unavailable in SCCM 2007.
As a feature pack, R2 provided five new capabilities. Foremost is support for SQL Reporting Services, which enables the level of extensibility that many enterprises demand. Additionally R2 allows for integration with Microsoft's Forefront Client Security (FCS) application, allowing the usage of Desired Configuration Management packs to leverage the capabilities of the anti-virus and anti-spam of FCS. The third new feature is Client Status Reporting, which can assess the health of client machines. Also provided is true App-V 4.6 support for the newly labeled Soft-Grid system. Last, but certainly not least, are the improvements to Operating System Deployment, which include the ability to deploy the OS to computers without first adding them to the ConfigMgr database and the ability to use multicasts for OSD.
Perhaps the most powerful feature of the NT 6.x operating systems (Vista, Server 2008, and Windows 7) is their new BIOS-agnostic approach to deployment. In short, an image created on or for a Dell Computer could be deployed without modification to a Lenovo or a Hewlett-Packard. That was hardly the case with the previous Microsoft operating systems as images made for Dell 620s could not be deployed to Dell 630s. Unfortunately, Microsoft's initial NT 6.0 end user OS ran into substantial "market resistance" from the enterprise user. While I was an early proponent of Vista, that OS suffered some drawbacks. Now, with Windows 7, we finally had something we could whole-heartedly support. With a Release to Market to essentially coincide of that of Windows 7, ConfigMgr 2007 SP2 was launched.
Friday, June 7, 2013
Data Center Energy Efficiency - Looking Beyond PUE
The Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) metric has become the de facto standard for measuring data center energy efficiency. PUE compares the total power going into a data center with the amount of power used to power IT equipment (servers, storage, and network). There is increasing pressure being exerted on data center managers to take measures to reduce the PUE. Unfortunately, the proper usage of PUE is often misunderstood and, by focusing solely on this single metric, it may mean data center managers are missing out on other opportunities to affect sustained reductions in energy use.
The Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) metric was introduced by the Green Grid, an association of IT professionals focused on increasing the energy efficiency of data centers. In the white paper Green Grid Data Center Power Efficiency Metrics: PUE and DCiE (Belady, Rawson, Pfleuger, & Cader, 2007), the authors lay out the case for the introduction of metrics to measure energy efficiency in the data center.
The Green Grid believes that several metrics can help IT organizations better understand and improve the energy efficiency of their existing datacenters, as well as help them make smarter decisions on new datacenter deployments. In addition, these metrics provide a dependable way to measure their results against comparable IT organizations.
There is a great deal of truth in the adage "You can't manage what you can't measure". In order to manage energy efficiency in the data center, it is imperative to have metrics in place to measure the impact of changes. There were two primary metrics introduced, PUE and DCE (Data Center Efficiency). The latter was later changed to DCiE (Data Center Infrastructure Efficiency). Both metrics measure the same two parameters, the total power into the data center and the IT equipment power.
While both metrics had their supporters, PUE became the standard metric.
A PUE value of 1 would represent the optimal data center efficiency. In practical terms, a PUE value of 1 means that all power going into the data center is being used to power IT equipment. Anything above a value of 1 means there is data center overhead required to support the IT load.
What components make up this overhead? Let's look at where the power going into a data center is consumed.
Ideally, we would like all power entering the data center to be used to power the IT load (servers, storage and network). This would result in a PUE value of 1. Realistically, however, some of this power must be diverted to support cooling, lighting and other support infrastructure. Some of the remaining power is consumed due to losses in the power system. The remaining power then goes to service the IT load.
Let's look at an example to see how PUE is calculated. If the power entering the data center (measured at the utility meter) is 100 kW and the power consumed by the IT load (measured at the output of the UPS) is 50 kW, we would calculate PUE as follows:
A PUE value of 2.0 is fairly typical for a data center. This means that for every watt required to power a server, we actually consume 2 watts of power. It is important to remember that we are paying for the power entering the data center, so every watt of overhead represents an additional cost. Reducing this overhead will reduce our overall operating costs for the data center.
If we want to improve data center energy efficiency, there are two areas in which we can affect change. If we can reduce the power going to the support infrastructure or reduce losses in the power system, more of the power entering the data center will make it to the IT load. This will improve our energy efficiency and reduce our PUE.
PUE is a great tool for the facilities side of the data center. It allows facility engineers to measure the impact of changes they make to the infrastructure, things like raising the data center temperature, upgrading to a higher efficiency UPS, increasing voltage to the rack and so on. PUE must be used with care, however. It must be understood that IT changes can have a dramatic impact on PUE.
Under pressure to reduce costs, and in some cases to try to match the reported PUE from other companies, data center managers are being pushed to significantly reduce their PUE value. Unfortunately, this is not always the right approach. The drive to reduce PUE at all costs can actually have a negative impact. If data center managers focus only on reducing PUE, they may inadvertently use more energy and increase data center costs.
Let's run through an example on how this can happen. Suppose we have a data center which has input power of 100 kW, 50kW of which is being used to power IT equipment. As previously illustrated, this would give us an initial PUE value of 2.0.
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