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DAILY NEWS AND INFORMATION
FOR THE GLOBAL GRID COMMUNITY / SEPTEMBER 22, 2003: VOL. 2 NO. 38
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Applications:
IBM SUPERCOMPUTER POWERS TESTING
OF MELANOMA DIAGNOSIS TOOLS
IBM announced that Electro-Optical Sciences will be using IBM's deep
computing
on demand facility to access supercomputing power over the Internet, helping
to free them from the fixed costs and management responsibility of owning and
operating a supercomputer.
Electro-Optical Sciences is the first example of a life sciences customer
using IBM's deep computing on demand facility. EOS has created, MelaFind, a
computerized hand-held diagnostic device for non-invasive early detection of
malignant melanoma, which could be used by a doctor or nurse while a patient
is still in the office.
The IBM on demand facility will provide variable peakload compute capacity
to
respond to requirements beyond the capabilities of EOS' in-house systems. Such
requirements may include, for example, analysis of clinical trial data, the
preparation of documentation for the FDA and validation of ongoing product
enhancements.
"MelaFind's computer vision can outperform human vision in clinical
detection
of melanoma," said Dr. Marek Elbaum, CEO of Electro-Optical Sciences. "Adding
the supercomputing power allows us to rapidly train the statistical pattern
recognition algorithms that we use to differentiate images of melanoma from
benign look-alike lesions in order render a reliable and objective
diagnosis."
The EOS technology has been applied to the detection of early melanoma, the
early detection of tooth decay, for chronic wound management and it has
potential applications for the early detection of other cancers.
"The on demand computing model helps allow customers to avoid technological
risk as well as the financial risk associated with ownership," said David
Turek, vice president of IBM Deep Computing. "Deep computing on demand is
designed to fulfill those two goals, freeing customers to focus on growing
their business."
With deep computing on demand customers can:
- help avoid large IT capital outlays and long term depreciation or lease
schedules -- this is especially important for companies with short term
projects
- bring to bear, on a temporary basis, massive amounts of compute power that
could be otherwise unaffordable and which helps provide strategic insight
- help lower overall operating costs
- help improve price/performance for compute-intensive applications and
processing of massive amounts of data
- off-load certain system maintenance to IBM
- use the latest technologies to help maximize performance
- meet the urgent computational needs of new business opportunities that
could otherwise be cost-prohibitive.
The deep computing on demand facility is located in a highly secure
section
of
IBM's Poughkeepsie, NY plant. The system consists of a cluster of IBM eServer
xSeries Intel-based Linux systems with related disk storage, and is planned to
include pSeries UNIX servers. Designed for scalability to meet increased
demand, the deep computing on demand facility is also planned to incorporate a
variety of blade technologies and AMD technologies over time. The service
caters to a broad spectrum of companies that have peaks and valleys in their
need for supercomputing power. These could include Hollywood studios that may
need to use supercomputing power to create animated movies as well as
petroleum companies for seismic imaging and research. Financial services
organizations, government agencies and national research laboratories could
also be potential customers.
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