Research Computing

The University of Sydney provides on-demand access to High Performance Computing (HPC) and Virtual Research Desktop services to support high-quality research as part of our investment in improving research infrastructure.

High Performance Computing – Artemis HPC

High Performance Computing (HPC) involves the use of supercomputers, parallel computing and/or computer clusters for advanced computing tasks including modelling, batch data processing and analysis.

The University supports two main facilities for our staff and students. We run a local cluster called Artemis and are partners in the Australia’s National Computational Infrastructure (NCI) facility. Both are free for academic and research users, and they provide complementary services for your research.

The Artemis service was upgraded in 2018 and hosts:

  • 7636 compute cores
  • 108 NVIDIA V100 GPUs
  • 56 Gbps FDR Infiniband networking
  • A high-performance Lustre filesystem
  • Three high memory nodes with 6 terabytes of RAM per node

Find out more about the Artemis service including the hardward specification and user guide here.

Artemis documentation

For information about how to use the Artemis service:

Virtual Research Desktops

Virtual Research Desktops deliver on-demand computing resources. It is designed for graphical processing and visualisation within a graphical user interface.

Argus offers virtual machines with the following operating systems: Windows 7, Windows 10, RedHat 7, Ubuntu 16.04 LTS. The University provides small, medium and large Virtual Machines suited to computationally-intensive applications.

Type vCPU RAM vGPU
Small 4 16 GB 2
Medium 8 32 GB 4
Large 16 126 GB 8

Argus documentation

For information about how to use the Argus service:

Training and support

The Sydney Informatics Hub also provide a broad range of training and support for specialised research computing and data management. Training courses include: data capture and management, programming in R/Matlab/Python, GPU computing and deep learning, bioinformatics, statistics, experimental and analytical design.

Learn more about our courses and view our training schedule.

Be part of the data and analytics community: Chat with mentors and peers about your HPC research at our monthly Hacky Hour!

SIH Publication Incentive

The Sydney Informatics Hub Publication Incentive is now open!

Users of Artemis HPC, NCI Raijin, and SIH services can submit eligible papers to win cash prizes up to $1000!

The Sydney Informatics Hub Publication Incentive will be run throughout the year.

To be eligible, papers should:

  1. Be published in a peer-reviewed journal
  2. Be authored or co-authored by a current University of Sydney staff member or student
  3. Have made use of SIH services (e.g. Argus, Artemis, HPC, data analysis)
  4. Acknowledge the Sydney Informatics Hub
  5. Ensure that the publication is listed under your Research Outputs on IRMA
  6. Not have been entered in a previous round of the incentive

To enter:

  1. Ensure your paper meets the eligibility criteria above
  2. Complete the attached Excel entry form (you can include multiple publications within the same form)
  3. Email your completed Excel form along with a PDF version of your published manuscript/manuscripts to SIH Info
  4. Entries must be received by 31st March 2018 5 pm

The continued acknowledgment of the use of SIH facilities ensures the sustainability of our services. Thank you and good luck!

Some suggested phrasing for the acknowlegment:
The authors acknowledge the facilities, and the scientific and technical assistance of the Sydney Informatics Hub at the University of Sydney and, in particular, access to the high performance computing facility Artemis.

The authors acknowledge the Sydney Informatics Hub and the University of Sydney’s high performance computing cluster Artemis for providing the high performance computing resources that have contributed to the research results reported within this paper.

Please see the terms of use