Research Computing Systems at the Geophysical Institute provides advanced computing, storage, data sharing solutions, and research cyberinfrastructure support to University of Alaska Fairbanks research communities, collaborators, and supporters. Network, system, and services status is available.

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Proposal Support

Service Rates (updated July 1, 2024)

High Performance Computing Condo Model - Chinook
	Service Description	Price	$HOME Quota	$CENTER1 Quota
Tier 1	Open to UAF research community using community nodes and unused portions of shareholder nodes.	$0 for UA faculty, staff, and students	User: 50 GB	Project: 1 TB
				Additional: $0.15/GB/yr*
Tier 2	For projects requiring runtimes beyond what is offered by Tier 1 or priority access to HPC resources.	~$10500 / std node; 3-yr membership	User: 50 GB	Project: 1 TB + 1 TB per node or equivalent investment
		~$10750 / std node; 4-yr membership
		~$11000 / std node; 5-yr membership		Additional: $0.15/GB/yr*
Tier 3	For projects requiring dedicated HPC resources.	Contact RCS	Contact RCS	Contact RCS

Storage
Online Spinning Disk
Option 1 - Lease Disk	1 TB or less:  $.12/GB/year ($120/TB/year) 1.1 to 29.9 TBs:  $90/TB/year 30 TBs or more:  $60/TB/year
Option 2 - Purchase Disk	Price of hardware, 20 hours labor install first year
	Under Warranty: $5/raw TB/yr < 1PB or $5/usable TB/year >= 1PB
	Out of Warranty: $5/raw TB/yr + cost of replacement parts/drives + hourly labor for repair time
Additional copies on tape	$0.05/GB/yr*
Offline Tape Archive ($ARCHIVE)
PI Quota	30 TB $0 for any PI to distribute among their projects
Additional Quota	$0.05/GB/yr* for any PI to distribute among their projects
Purchase Disk Cache Purchase Tapes	cost of disk array + $5/raw TB/year < 1PB or $5/usable TB/yr >= 1PB cost of media + $15.75/tape/yr, minimum 9 tapes (180 TBs)

Linux Server Support
	Price**
Basic - RCS assists w/ system administration.	A work authorization for a minimum of 80 hours / year
Standard - RCS performs all system administration.	First year - a work authorization for 20 hours to install & support. Each year thereafter - $1,000 or $5/TB, whichever is greater.

Virtual Machines
	CPU	Memory	Image Storage	Price/year**
1c2g Subsidized Limit: 1 per PI.	1	2 GB	50 GB	$0 for the first VM $75 each addtl VM
2c2g	2	2 GB	50 GB	$90
2c4g	2	4 GB	50 GB	$180
2c8g	2	8 GB	50 GB	$360
4c8g	4	8 GB	50 GB	$540
2c16g	2	16 GB	50 GB	$720
4c16g	4	16 GB	50 GB	$900
custom	>=4	>=16 GB	>=50 GB	$1000

Web Hosting Options
	Price
UA Google Sites	$0; provided by OIT
RCS Hosted Drupal or WordPress Site	Cost of Virtual Machine or Server + $300/year Initial site development or significant changes/upgrades by RCS require a separate work authorization. Minimum VM Size: Small Non-UA domains are available at additional cost.

*Offered in 100 GB increments.
**Includes backup of standard directories within system image.

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Please contact RCS at uaf-rcs@alaska.edu for assistance assessing your research project IT needs.

RCS services are for research projects and groups. Colleges, administrative offices and academic departments should contact OIT at helpdesk@alaska.edu.

All services are subject to availability and rates are subject to change.

A minimum $25 per year will be charged for any unsubsidized services utilized.

Services are invoiced upfront annually at the start of the fiscal year.

Additional labor to support project development or implementation may be coordinated between a PI and RCS, and direct charged to an award fund/org with permission granted by the PI through a Work Authorization.

 

Facilities Statement

Access to the RCS Facilities Statement (requires UA login).

 

RCS Citation

Has your recent work using RCS resources resulted in publication? Please include the following text in your publication(s):

This work was supported in part by the high-performance computing and data storage resources operated by the Research Computing Systems Group at the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute.

 

Proposal Support and Cost Estimates

Please contact RCS if additional proposal support or information is needed. Any project subject to data restrictions such as ITAR or NIST standards should also contact RCS for assistance. For current service rates please refer to our current Service Rates above.

 

Services

New Users

Access to RCS resources requires that you be a member of a project established by a UA principal investigator. Tenured or tenure track faculty, research faculty and emeritus faculty are normally allowed to serve as a principal investigator. Other university employees, including staff, research associates or post-doctoral fellows, may not serve as principal investigators unless granted an exception by their institute director or academic dean with the approval of the UAF Office of Sponsored Programs.

 

UA Principal Investigator

To establish a new project please fill out the project account application form.

Principal investigators are responsible for the members, storage and other resource use of a project, and if additional resources are needed that are not covered by RCS subsidized services, procurement will be routed through the PI.

Prior to establishing a project the principal investigator should note any special data management needs such as any obligations on data security, how long data must be retained, and/or ITAR compliance, and notify RCS during the project creation process.

 

UA Collaborator

If you are a UA principal investigator wanting to collaborate with non-UA colleagues on RCS or UA systems, please email uaf-rcs@alaska.edu with the subject: "Guest Account Application." Please include your project name and the collaborator's first name, last name and email address. Sponsored user accounts expire annually on June 30.

UA Classes and Course Instructors

Instructors may request a project for their classes. Please complete a project account application form and user account application form, and provide a list of students and their UA usernames to be added to the class project. One TB of long-term, offline tape storage ($ARCHIVE) is provided for class projects. Student data stored in the high performant online spinning disk ($CENTER1) will be deleted annually at the end of the spring semester. Class accounts must be renewed annually.

UA Staff or Student

You will need to fill out a user account application form and the project PI must email RCS to request to add you as a member of their project. 

High Performance Computing

Are you interested in using the Chinook HPC cluster in your computational work? Please read our directions on how to obtain RCS project and user accounts.

In 2016, the Geophysical Institute launched Chinook as an energy efficient Linux cluster purchased from Penguin Computing, Inc. Chinook is a condo-style HPC cluster for UA researchers. As of November 2024, the computing environment includes:

• 67x Relion 1900 Compute Nodes each with dual Intel Xeon 14-core processors (28 cores per node) and 128 GB memory
• 38x Relion XE1112 Compute Nodes each with dual Intel Xeon Scalable 20-core processors (40 cores per node) and 192 GBs memory
• 17x Relion XE1312 Compute Nodes each with dual Intel Xeon Scalable Gold 6442y+ 24-core processors (48 cores per node) and 256 GBs memory
• 3x Relion 1900 Compute Nodes each with dual Intel Xeon 14-core processors (28 cores per node) and 1.5 TB memory
• 5x Altus XE2318GT Compute Nodes each with dual AMD EPYC 9224 24-core processors (48 cores per node), eight NVIDIA L40S-PCIe GPUs, and 1.5 TBs DDR5 memory
• 1x Altus XE5318GTS Compute node with dual AMD EPYC 9224 24-core processors (48 cores per node), eight NVIDIA HGX-H100 SXM5 GPUs, and 1.5 TBs DDR5 memory
• Multiple login nodes with dual Intel Xeon processors and 48 or more GBs memory
• Rocky Linux 8 operating system, Slurm open-source workload management software, and Scyld ClusterWare HPC management software
• Compute and login node access to a 307 TB Lustre scratch file system
• Login node access to a 13+ PB tape library

Chinook is named in honor of long time GI colleague Kevin Engle's unique, strong, collaborative nature and passion for salmon and Alaska.

Chinook is made possible by the Geophysical Institute, IARC, IAB, the UAF Vice Chancellor for Research, and your fellow colleagues who contribute shares. In 2016-2017, Chinook compute expansions were supported with funding from the M. J. Murdock Charitable Trust. In 2024-2025, a Chinook GPU & storage expansion was supported with funding from NSF award #2320196, "MRI Track-I: Acquisition of CyBR: Cyber Infrastructure for Big Data Research Critical for Alaska".

Chinook HPC Documentation

Network

Wireless

WiFi is available to UA students and employees through the eduroam or UAlaska networks. Visitor access is available via the UAGuest network.

To connect to the eduroam network from Linux, see these instructions (UA login required).

 

VPN

Access to some GI and RCS resources is restricted to the UA network and VPN. To connect to the VPN, see OIT's Remote Connectivity (VPN) page.

 

Port Activation

For Ethernet port activations, please contact uaf-rcs@alaska.edu.

Storage

High-Performance Computing Storage

High-Performance Computing storage ($CENTER1) is high throughput, scratch storage available to Chinook users. $CENTER1 is a Lustre filesystem best used for large files. Reading or writing many small files may result in a noticeable performance reduction.

As a scratch workspace, data in $CENTER1 is not backed up. Files requiring long-term storage should be copied to a different system or filesystem such as $ARCHIVE. Data in $CENTER1 is not purged, but if files are deleted or overwritten or the filesystem crashes or is corrupted, there is no restoring the data if there isn't a copy elsewhere except to regenerate it.

Projects are subject to a quota in $CENTER1. Quotas and utilization may be checked using the “show_storage” command. Always check to see if there is storage available for your date to be written as files that go over the quota may be truncated, unwritten, or block other write access to the filesystem. If you need to temporarily use more than your project's quota of scratch space, contact uaf-rcs@alaska.edu to request a temporary increase for up to 30 days. Include how much additional space is needed and a paragraph justifying the need for additional space.

Subsidized quota: 1 TB per project

Online Spinning Disk

Online spinning disk is used to share data and VM storage. Data may be backed up automatically to $ARCHIVE for an additional service fee or principal investigators may back up online spinning disk data manually to their $ARCHIVE account using their subsidized 10 TB or any additional purchased $ARCHIVE storage. Online spinning disk storage will generally perform more slowly when used with high-performance computing.

Offline Tape Archive

The offline tape archive ($ARCHIVE) is a long-term storage solution for infrequently accessed data, such as retention of completed work or an archive of data. Data stored in $ARCHIVE is written out to magnetic tape and must be retrieved when copied to another filesystem, resulting in very slow access times. Files in $ARCHIVE should be copied or moved to another filesystem before modifying or using the files.

Principal investigators in $ARCHIVE are subject to quota. When quota is reached files may no longer be written, and a file that is currently being written to the filesystem may be truncated or deleted, and access to writing and moving files may be lost. It is always recommended to check that there is enough space to write your file. Quotas and current usage can be viewed with the “show_storage” command.

Subsidized quota: 10 TB per Project Investigator

Storage Documentation

Software & Operating Systems

Proprietary software licenses hosted by RCS are made available to the UAF campus network. Please see the below links (log in using your UA credentials) for more information.

• Abaqus 2016
• IDL / ENVI
• MATLAB (please visit RCS if a node-locked license is required) 
• ArchAssault
• CentOS
• Ubuntu

If you need assistance installing any of these, or any other software, contact RCS at uaf-rcs@alaska.edu. 

Web Services

Content Management Systems

Drupal

Drupal is a popular open source content management system (CMS). The Drupal community provides thousands of themes and plugins to customize the appearance and functionality of websites. Its modular architecture makes Drupal an ideal choice for rapid development of virtually any type of website.

Examples of the many things that can be built with Drupal include:

• Websites with complex access roles and editing privileges.
• Conference websites with attendee abstract submission and review systems.
• Audio/video content catalogs that are simultaneously served out as podcasts.
• User-friendly databases with intricate tagging and searching systems to aid discovery.
• API endpoints that integrate with other web applications or mobile apps.

For more information, see Drupal.org. RCS provides full support for Drupal hosting, including consultation and development services.

WordPress

WordPress is another popular CMS that is geared towards blogging. Like Drupal, the WordPress community provides thousands of themes and plugins to customize the appearance and functionality of your website. WordPress is best suited for:

• Small-to-medium sized websites.
• Websites with frequent blog entries and simple, static web pages.
• Ease of use at the expense of flexibility.

For more information, see WordPress.org. RCS provides limited support for WordPress hosting.

RCS Supported Features

	Drupal	WordPress
File & Database Backups	Yes	Yes
Uptime & Performance Monitoring	Yes	Yes
Security Upgrades	Yes	Yes
SSL	Yes	Yes
Google Analytics	Yes	Yes
Static Archiving / Retirement	Available	Available
Consulting & Development	Available	Available
Domain Registration	Available	Available

Please contact uaf-rcs@alaska.edu to schedule a consultation to assess your website's needs.

Consulting / Development

RCS provides consulting and development services spanning many areas of web development, including:

• Drupal
• PHP
• JavaScript / Node.js
• Leaflet
• MySQL
• PostreSQL / PostGIS

Policies and Limitations

Limited to Research Projects & Groups

RCS web hosting services are for research projects and groups. Colleges, administrative offices and academic departments should contact OIT at helpdesk@alaska.edu.

Security Updates

Security updates are performed automatically on RCS web hosts to prevent attacks and unauthorized access. In rare cases these updates may introduce compatibility issues that will need to be resolved. RCS is not responsible for fixing issues that arise from automated security updates, but PIs may open a Work Authorization to support consultation and development as needed.

Expiration

Each website hosted at RCS expires at the end of each fiscal year unless renewed by the PI. PIs may coordinate with RCS to identify available archive options if a site has reached end-of-life.

 

Custom Domains

Custom domains (domains not ending in uaf.edu or alaska.edu) can be purchased at additional cost. These domains must be managed by RCS. New domains will need to be purchased by RCS on the PI's behalf. Existing custom domains will need to be transferred to RCS.

Workstation Support

RCS provides workstation support to facilitate Geophysical Institute research. Researchers at the Geophysical Institute should contact uaf-rcs@alaska.edu for workstation support.

Administration staff should contact the OIT Help Desk for workstation support.

Supported Platforms

Linux, Windows, and Mac (including Apple-certified repairs)

Hardware

We keep a collection of cables, adaptors and peripherals on hand for use within the Geophysical Institute. Larger hardware components (e.g., monitors) must be checked out.

Licensed Software

We provide several licensed software packages for workstations. Other licensed software is provided to employees and students though OIT.

Google Backup & Sync

Google Backup & Sync is a program that allows you to automatically backup your documents and files to your Google Drive. It is currently OIT's recommended automatic data backup solution. For more information, visit OIT's Google Backup & Sync web page.