A unified framework for the deployment, exposure and access of HPC applications as services in clouds

Abstract

Clouds have provided on-demand, scalable and affordable High Performance Computing (HPC) resources to discipline (e.g., Biology, Medicine, Chemistry) scientists. However, the steep learning curve of preparing a HPC cloud and deploying HPC applications has hindered many scientists to achieve innovative discoveries for which HPC resources must be relied on. With the world moving to web-based tools, scientists are also seeking more web-based technologies to support their research. Unfortunately, the discipline problems of high-performance computational research are both unique and complex, which make the development of web-based tools for this research difficult. This paper presents our work on developing a unified cloud framework that allows discipline users to easily deploy and expose HPC applications in public clouds as services. To provide a proof of concept, we have implemented the cloud framework prototype by integrating three components: (i) Amazon EC2 public cloud for providing HPC infrastructure, (ii) a HPC service software library for accessing HPC resources, and (iii) the Galaxy web-based platform for exposing and accessing HPC application services. This new approach can reduce the time and money needed to deploy, expose and access discipline HPC applications in clouds.