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Fellows Program

The Fellows Program partners Campus Champions with Extended Collaborative Support Services (ECSS) staff and research teams to work side by side on real-world science and engineering projects.

The cyberinfrastructure expertise developed by high-end application support staff in XSEDE's Extended Collaborative Support Services (ECSS) program can be difficult to disseminate to the large numbers of researchers who would benefit from this knowledge. Among their many roles, XSEDE Campus Champions (CC) serve as local experts on national cyberinfrastructure resources and organizations, such as XSEDE. Champions are closely connected to those doing cutting-edge research on their campuses. The goal of the Campus Champions (CC) Fellows program is to increase cyberinfrastructure expertise on campuses by including CCs as partners in XSEDE's Extended Collaborative Support Services (ECSS) projects.

The Fellows program partners Campus Champions with ECSS staff and research teams to work side by side on real-world science and engineering projects. In 2015, the types of projects offered have expanded beyond ECSS projects. In addition to ECSS, Champions now have the opportunity to work with XSEDE Cyberinfrastructure Integration (XCI) to develop on-ramps from campuses to XSEDE, to work with Community Engagment & Enrichment staff to help create a formal undergraduate or graduate minor, concentration, or certificate program at their institution, or to design a project of their choosing. Fellows will develop expertise within varied areas of cyberinfrastructure, and they are already well positioned to share their advanced knowledge through their roles as the established conduits to students, administrators, professional staff, and faculty on their campuses. A directory of Fellows will expand the influence even further by creating a network of individuals with these unique skill sets. In addition to the technical knowledge gleaned from their experiences, the individual Fellows will benefit from their personal interactions with the ECSS staff and will acquire the skills necessary to manage similar user or research group project requests on their own campuses. The Campus Champions Fellows program is a unique, rare opportunity for a select group of individuals to learn first-hand about the application of high-end cyberinfrastructure to challenging science and engineering problems.

A volunteer partner opportunity - ECSS Affiliates

Accepted Fellows make a 400-hour time commitment and are paid a $15,000 annual stipend for their efforts. The program includes funding for two one- to two-week visits to an ECSS or research team site to enhance the collaboration and also funding to attend and present at a Fellows symposium at an XSEDE conference.

The following are the types of skills that may be developed, depending on project assignments:

  • Use of profiling and tracking tools to better understand a code's characteristics
  • CUDA programming
  • Hybrid (MPI/OpenMP) programming
  • Optimal use of math libraries
  • Use of visualization tools, with a particular focus on large data sets
  • Use of I/O tools and software such as HDF5, MPI IO, and parallel file system optimization
  • Optimal use of scientific application software such as AMBER, ABAQUS, RaxML, MrBayes, etc.
  • Application of high-performance computing and high-throughput computing to non-traditional domains such as computational linguistics, economics, genomics
  • Single-processor optimization techniques
  • Benchmarking, including concepts of sockets, binding processes to cores, and impacts of these in optimization
  • Optimal data transfer techniques including the use of grid-ftp and Globus Online
  • Cluster scheduling, tuning for site-specific goals
  • Managing credentials, security practices
  • Monitoring resources with information services
  • Understanding failure conditions and programming for fault tolerance
  • Automated work and data flow systems
  • Web tools and libraries for building science gateways or portals that connect to high-end resources
  • Data management through tools such as iRODS and SAGA

For questions about the program please contact outreach-ccfellows@xsede.org.