About NCI

Role

NCI has been established under an agreement between ANU and the Commonwealth Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research (Department of Innovation) to:

• provide high-end, capability computational services, to the Australian research community,
• advise the Department of Innovation on further investments in the national computing fabric for specialised systems that can support high end computing requirements in particular application areas,
• operate a community based merit allocation scheme that grants access to NCRIS funded resources,
• provide advisory and support expertise to research communities benefiting from NCRIS computational infrastructure investments,
• develop national strategy for the advancement of computational infrastructure in Australia.

 
In addition to the planning, access and outreach activities, these objectives highlight the three operational functions of NCI:

• The National Facility (link) which provides the national peak computing system for capability computing,
• Specialised Facilities (link) that provide access to high-end computing resource that complement the National Facility in its support for particular research communities and their applications,
• The Computational Tools and Techniques (link) program that provides targeted software development support for particular research communities in order to improve their access to a tailored and high quality computational research environment.
  

Governance

NCI is governed by ANU on advice from the NCI Steering Committee, the composition of which reflects the range of organisations that have a major interest in Australia’s usage, uptake and advancement of capability computing.

The present membership of the Steering Committee is:
 

	Emeritus Professor Mark S. Wainwright AM NCI Steering Committee Chair.
	Professor Robin Stanton Pro Vice-Chancellor The Australian National University.
	Dr Alex Zelinsky Information and Communication Sciences and Technologies, CSIRO and Director, CSIRO ICT Centre.
	Dr Neville Smith Deputy Director and Chief Scientist Bureau of Meteorology.
	Dr Chris Pigram Deputy Chief Executive Officer Geoscience Australia.
	Professor Doug McEachern Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) University of Western Australia.
	Professor Brian Yates Chair, Merit Allocation Committee and Head, School of Chemistry University of Tasmania.
	Professor Lindsay Botten Director, NCI.