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The region's first supercomputer is set to be established in Dubai with its maiden foray into biotechnology research. Shaikh Nahyan Bin Mubarak Al Nahyan, UAE Minister of Education and Chairman of the Higher Colleges of Technology, and Mohammad Al Gergawi, CEO of Dubai Holding, have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to work together to provide the business partners of Dubai Biotechnology and Research Park (DuBiotech), Dubai's Free Zone dedicated to the biotechnology, pharmaceutical and life sciences sectors, with the capability to conduct research using IBM's Blue Gene supercomputer. Gergawi signed the MoU on behalf of DuBiotech and Shaikh Nahyan signed on behalf of the Centre of Excellence for Applied Research and Training (CERT), the UAE technology and research organisation. Under the terms of DuBiotech's agreement with CERT, DuBiotech will tap into 5.7 Teraflops of supercomputing power (equivalent to 5.7 trillion mathematical operations per second) provided by the Blue Gene system at Cert. This mammoth capacity will be made available to business partners at DuBiotech to conduct life science research. The agreement, announced at the IBM stand at Gitex 2005, means that business partners engaged in biotechnology research and development at DuBiotech will have the opportunity to make use of Cert's supercomputing centre. "This immensely powerful supercomputer is normally used in astronomy, academic and life science research involving proteomics and protein interactions requiring significant computing power. This represents a unique opportunity for DuBiotech and CERT to boost bio-technology research for the Middle East," said Dr Abdul Qader Al Khayat, executive director of DuBiotech. "This further benefits the leaders in biotechnology who are looking to develop new advances that counter medical issues prevalent in the Gulf, such as thalassaemia, diabetes, anaemia and cancer."
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