IBM helps academics get their heads in the cloud

IBM DOESN'T CLOWN AROUND when it comes to the cloud. The firm has just launched cloud computing infrastructure for university boffins in Qatar, South Africa and Japan.

Giving university students and researchers access to IBM's cloud computing infrastructure will help speed up certain projects which were previously a bit stuck due to antiquated and overloaded campus IT resources, IBM reckons.

IBM currently runs 13 cloud computing centres across the globe, and is apparently seeking to further its influence in the sector by getting to bright, young, underfunded things in the world's universities.

IBM's cloud infrastructure will purportedly be used for a number of important projects. In Qatar, for instance, the Cloud Computing Initiative will be used for geophysical applications such as seismic modeling and the exploration for oil and gas. Three universities - Qatar University, Texas A&M University and Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar - will all share this particular cloud infrastructure, whilst working with IBM to develop it further.

In South Africa, IBM is setting up shop in the University of Pretoria, to help students better understand drug absorption rates and determine how better to slow the progression of serious illnesses in the African continent.

IBM is also working with the Higher Education Alliance for Leadership Through Health (HEALTH Alliance) in East Africa to provide online education through virtual computing labs. The alliance, made up of a consortium of seven universities in East Africa, will supposedly allow students remote access to a smorgasbord of educational material.

HEALTH also eventually hopes to migrate the cloud from IBM's South African Cloud Computing Centre to its own, on-site cloud, which it plans to set up at one of the participating universities.

And in Japan's Kyushu University in Fukuoka, students can enjoy the irony of learning all about cloud computing management, design applications and cloud infrastructures directly from IBM's cloud. µ