Issue 146 February/March 2016 CONTENTS


Laboratory informatics Drug development in the virtual world


In her series of profiles of bioinformatics companies, Sophia Ktori looks at the work of biosimulation specialist Certara


Is life different in the cloud?


Sophia Ktori looks at how vendors and customers of informatics systems are having to change their IT culture


Data security in a collaborative environment


Te R&D sector is increasingly turning to collaborative projects to boost innovation, writes Sophia Ktori


Paperless on the Med


An outline of the Paperless Lab Academy, to be held in the city of Barcelona in April High-performance computing


Gazing into the HPC crystal ball


Andrew Jones looks ahead to see what the coming year has in store for HPC


HPC finally climbs into the cloud


Interest in migrating HPC to the cloud is growing rapidly, as Tom Wilkie discovers Applications Simulating a breeze


Gemma Church investigates how simulation soſtware can help with the siting of a wind farm Revving up knowledge


Robert Roe investigates the use of simulation soſtware in the high-octane world of motorbike racing


Product Innovation Congress


A preview of the product lifecycle management event being held in Munich in March Resources Suppliers' directory Viewpoint


EDITORIAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE TEAM Editor-in-chief Dr Tom Wilkie editor.scw@europascience.com


Specialist reporters Robert Roe, Sophia Ktori, Gloria Metrick, Gemma Church Circulation/readership enquiries subscriptions@europascience.com


ADVERTISING TEAM Advertising sales Darren Ebbs Tel: +44 (0)1223 275 465 Fax: +44 (0)1223 213 385 darren.ebbs@europascience.com


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GOOD NEWS: THE FUTURE IS CLOUDY


Could 2016 be the year in which scientific computing finally takes off into the cloud? In this issue, we publish the second instalment of Sophia Ktori’s report on the role of the cloud in laboratory informatics (page 8) and the first instalment of Tom Wilkie’s exploration of cloud computing in high-performance computing (page 24). In both sectors, the degree of interest when we first announced that we were going to investigate the relevance of the cloud was so great that we have had to split our reporting over more than one issue of the magazine. Less attention has been paid, perhaps, to


modelling and engineering soſtware, but it too is migrating to the cloud. Last year, Ansys offered a cloud service, followed in January 2016 by the French ESI group. Tis issue of the magazine continues the


expansion of our coverage of informatics and of engineering soſtware. In addition to her cloud report, Sophia Ktori looks at the challenges that the trend to outsourcing pose for informatics soſtware on page 12 and on page 4 profiles Certara, the bioinformatics company that has grown significantly over the past few years. Gemma Church looks at wind energy on


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page 30 – in particular, the challenges of efficiently siting a wind farm – while Robert Roe gets on his bike on page 34. On page 20, meanwhile, Andrew Jones,


leader of NAG’s HPC Consulting and Services, offers a preview of what the year will have in store for the topic of high- performance computing. It is inevitable that a new year brings


thoughts of change and of new developments, but in the area of scientific computing, this does not seem forced. Tere is innovation and novelty aplenty – lots to read about, and lots for us to write about. Happy New Year to all!


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Dan Katz argues that science is facing a social challenge to increase the sustainability of soſtware


Production manager Alex Mappledoram Tel: +44 (0)1223 275 471 Fax: +44 (0)1223 213 385 alex.mappledoram@europascience.com


CORPORATE TEAM Chairman Dr Tom Wilkie Managing director Warren Clark Web www.scientific-computing.com


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FEBRUARY/MARCH 2016 3 Tom Wilkie Editor-in-chief


Cover: Alex Mappledoram/Iaroslav Neliubov/ Palm Palmish/Shutterstock.com


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