SDSC Offers Supercomputer Resources; Map Challenge Submission Deadline Extended

Nov 9, 2015: We have two major announcements regarding the ongoing Map Challenge.

First, the San Diego Supercomputing Center (SDSC) is generously offering supercomputing resources to support the Map Challenge. The resources, made available through an SDSC Director’s Discretionary Award, include 1 Million core-hours on SDSC Gordon and 20TB of sandbox data storage on Gordon’s parallel file system Data Oasis.

Second, we are extending the deadline for submission of completed reconstructions from benchmark data from December 31, 2015 to March 31, 2016. Thus far more than 30 scientists have registered to participate in the challenge. We anticipate that availability of this supercomputer resource, as well as the additional time, will better enable these scientists to complete their calculations and may also encourage additional scientists to participate.

The Map Challenge is one of two scientific community-wide challenges being sponsored by our project to critically evaluate cryo-electron microscopy methods that are coming into use. In the current challenge phase, participants are tasked to create 3D reconstructions (maps) of several different macromolecular complexes from benchmark raw images, and to then submit their results with a full description of their method. In the subsequent assessment phase, uploaded results will be compared/contrasted by various methods in a positive spirit.

Registered map challenge participants who wish to use SDSC Gordon may apply here. All applications must be received by November 20, 2015. Allocations will be made shortly thereafter.