National Institutes of Health Accelerates Breakthrough Medical
Research With Powerful 3Com Switch - BW, 07:06 a.m. Jan 26, 1999 Eastern
Foremost Health Research Facility Reconfigures Supercomputer Using
New 3Com(R) CoreBuilder(TM) 9000 Switch to Quicken Development
of New Drugs and Treatments
SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 26, 1999--
3Com Corporation (Nasdaq:COMS) today announced that the Computational Biophysics
Section of the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) has deployed 3Com's
CoreBuilder(TM) 9000 enterprise switch to speed advanced medical research using its
new supercomputer.
NHLBI, based in Bethesda, Md., is part of the Federal government's National Institutes
of Health, one of the foremost biomedical research centers in the world. NHLBI provides
national leadership for the research and treatment of heart, lung and blood diseases.
The CoreBuilder 9000 switch, which supports Gigabit Ethernet connectivity, will greatly
increase the supercomputer's performance, facilitating NHLBI's design of life-saving
drugs, antibiotics and treatments. "Our supercomputer, which we built in-house in 1997,
already provided ten times the performance of our previous systems," said Dr. Eric
Billings, staff scientist at NHLBI.
"Now, thanks to 3Com's CoreBuilder 9000 switch, we can cost-effectively multiply the
system's power, enabling us to conduct critical research in areas we couldn't before."
The supercomputer is a Beowulf-class device called LoBoS, which stands for Lots of
Boxes on Shelves. LoBoS's design calls for computational problems to be broken down
and distributed to large numbers of off-the-shelf desktop computers that are networked
together. By linking many conventional processors so each works on a piece of a
problem, LoBoS offers substantial power at a fraction of the cost of commercially
available supercomputers.
"LoBoS's processing power depends upon extremely high-speed communications to the
desktop systems, which is why we chose the CoreBuilder 9000 switch," said Dr.
Billings. "At first, we had 64 dual-processor machines linked in a ring topology, but as
we add more machines the ring becomes a limitation for the systems we can study."
Using the CoreBuilder 9000 switch, NHLBI is redesigning LoBoS to provide
higher-speed communications to desktops. The CoreBuilder 9000 switch will anchor 100
newly purchased Pentium Pro desktop PCs, each with two 450 megahertz processors and
3Com's Fast EtherLink(R) XL PCI network interface cards.
Sixteen desktops are currently connected with the switch's Gigabit Ethernet capability and
the balance will initially link directly to the CoreBuilder 9000 switch with multiple 100
megabits per second (Mbps) Fast Ethernet connections. Eventually, NHLBI will expand
the use of the switch's Gigabit Ethernet capability to all machines for still faster
connections to the desktop systems.
"All data going to and from the processors will pass through the switch, making it the
mission-critical piece in the design," added Dr. Billings.
"The CoreBuilder 9000 switch's high-port density and huge backplane ensure us of the
performance needed for the most demanding simulations. Its modular architecture
provides the bandwidth necessary for the scalability of LoBoS as we add still more
processors and upgrade communications to Gigabit Ethernet speeds." Ultimately, LoBoS
may feature more than 1,000 processors.
Additionally, researchers will use the CoreBuilder 9000 switch to improve LoBoS's
efficiencies by implementing virtual local area networks (VLANs).
"Computing jobs don't require every processor in the system," said Dr. Billings. "We'll
segment tasks among the many boxes with VLANs created by the CoreBuilder 9000
switch. This allows LoBoS to effectively process multiple jobs simultaneously, allowing
more researchers access to its computing power."
Vital Research Applications
LoBoS enables researchers to rapidly run vital research applications that facilitate the
design and development of new drugs for medical treatments. The Chemistry at Harvard
Molecular Mechanics simulation program, called CHARMM, allows researchers to model
the behavior of biological molecules.
"To determine how a particular bacteria resists penicillin, for example, we'll simulate the
behavior of some 20,000 atoms representing the penicillin and the bacteria's defensive
enzymes," explained Dr. Billings. "This helps us understand how infections persist in the
body and to develop more effective drugs."
Another application, The General Atomic and Molecular Electronic Structure System,
known as GAMESS, offers more granular quantum simulations where the interactions
between individual atoms are modeled.
"Before supercomputers, researchers studied biological molecules through painstaking
experimentation in labs, which often required months," said Dr. Billings.
"Today, LoBoS can simulate complex molecular behavior within several days, greatly
speeding the development of medical treatments. Using 3Com solutions, we can
accelerate this process, helping us to achieve breakthroughs in understanding the
molecular basis of disease."
About 3Com Corporation
With more than 200 million customers worldwide, 3Com Corporation connects more
people in more ways to information than any other networking company. 3Com delivers
innovative information access products and network system solutions to large, medium
and small enterprises; carriers and network service providers; PC OEMs; and consumers.
3Com-More connected(tm). For further information, visit 3Com's World Wide Web site
at 3com.com or the press site at 3com.com.
Copyright 1999, Business Wire
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