A student from Polar Grid partner Elizabeth City State University takes research samples during an expedition to Antarctica. (Photo courtesy of Elizabeth City State University)

According to polar scientists, the world's ice caps are shrinking and sea levels are rising, an environmental change that may have implications for all life on the planet. To better understand the current and future state of ice sheets, scientists must reliably collect and analyze large amounts of environmental data under extremely harsh conditions.

A team from Pervasive Technology Labs, University Information Technology Services and collaborating institutions is working to meet this challenge by creating a computational "Polar Grid" spanning from the North to the South Pole. The grid will be comprised of ruggedized laptops and computer clusters deployed in the field in the polar regions, and also two large scale computing clusters for detailed analysis in the U.S. - one to be installed at IU, and the other at Elizabeth City State University (ECSU).

Polar Grid will be comprised of ruggedized laptops and clusters deployed at field stations in the polar regions. (Photo courtesy of the Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets).

The Polar Grid project is funded by a $1.96 million grant from the National Science Foundation under the leadership of principal investigator Geoffrey C. Fox. Co-PIs include Craig Stewart and Marlon Pierce as well as Linda Hayden and Malcolm LeCompte from ECSU. The Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets at the University of Kansas is also an institutional partner in the project.

"The Polar Grid project will transform U.S. capabilities in ice sheet research," said Geoffrey Fox. "With this technology it will be possible to collect, examine, and analyze data - and then use the results of such analysis to optimize data collection strategies - all during the course of a single expedition. This will help scientists more quickly gain understanding about the potential impact of rising sea levels and how they relate to global climate change, a problem of urgent importance."

The Polar Grid represents a dramatic change from the current method of study, in which expeditions occur during the summer months, data is brought back to the U.S. for analysis, and a new expedition takes place the following year.

In addition to improving polar science research, the project builds upon Fox's existing efforts to help minority serving institutions enhance their research by gaining greater access to technology. The Polar Grid project will provide Elizabeth City State University, a historically black college in North Carolina, with a high performance computing cluster and will offer ECSU students hands-on internships and field experience.

"This will give ECSU a top-ranked 5 Teraflop high performance computing system, building on existing distance education and undergraduate laboratory infrastructure, that will enable crucial ice sheet science and educate a diverse workforce in both polar science and cyberinfrastructure, " said Linda Hayden, project co-principal investigator from ECSU.

Equipment installation for the Polar Grid project is slated to begin early in 2008.