The University of Colorado at Boulder聮s department of applied mathematics has been awarded a major equipment grant from Sun Microsystems of Sunnyvale, Calif.
Valued at about $120,000, the grant includes a large Sun Enterprise server and 15 high-performance graphic workstations. The grant supplements a $35,000 equipment grant from the National Science Foundation. CU-Boulder聮s College of Arts and Sciences, the Graduate School and the applied mathematics department provided matching funds.
The grant was designed to bring together faculty and students at all levels, complementing the department聮s Vertical Integration for Research and Education program that was funded by a recent $2.3 million grant from NSF. The VIGRE grant augments academic interaction among undergraduates, graduate students, post-doctoral students and faculty, said Professor James Curry, associate chair of the applied mathematics department.
The new computing configuration represents a roughly 14-fold increase in the raw computing power available to applied mathematics projects. Improved graphics and increased network speeds "represent a leap to the next level of excellence for the department聮s teaching and research efforts," said Curry.
"Ongoing research projects in computational mathematics, fast algorithms, physical applied mathematics, dynamical systems, nonlinear phenomena, statistics and applied probability will be enhanced by the grant," Curry said.
The College of Arts and Sciences and Information Technology Services in collaboration with applied mathematics will provide operational support for the equipment. The equipment also will be used for curriculum development projects as well as undergraduate and graduate research projects.
"Sun Microsystems worked hard with us, and for us, and has proven to be a wonderful partner in this venture," said Curry.