Leading research and education services provider, Monash University, and project partners the Australian Synchrotron, CSIRO and the Victorian Partnership of Advanced Computing (VPAC), today announced their AUS$8 million investment in a state-of-the-art supercomputer facility would have a direct impact on the study of conditions such as Asthma, Cystic Fibrosis, Diabetes and the development of future treatments for malaria and lung malfunction in premature babies.

Using the unique Multi-modal Australian ScienceS Imaging and Visualisation Environment, or MASSIVE, scientists will for the first time be able to create, analyse, view and interact with high-resolution 3D samples of their work in close to real time.

The Australian Synchrotron’s Head of Science, Associate Professor, Andrew Peele, said the expanded capabilities presented by this new technology were exciting for science and in particular research.

“In the past, the technology just didn’t exist to capture or view data or manipulate samples in a three-dimensional sense,” explained Dr Andrew Peele.

“Now we have a technology that allows us to do this in near real time and in 3D.”

The MASSIVE launch, which will be held at the Australian Synchrotron today, will provide Monash University, the Australian Synchrotron and its partners, CSIRO and VPAC, with a unique opportunity to demonstrate the future capability of the facility.

MASSIVE will be unveiled by the Victorian State Minister for Technology, the Honourable Gordon Rich-Phillips.

Monash University bioengineering researcher Dr Andreas Fouras said that the unique focus of MASSIVE has the capability to significantly advance research into fields such as lung research.

“MASSIVE will be a powerful tool that will allow us to extract information, such as intricate 3D lung structure, that was previously hidden within a huge amount of high resolution 3D data. It will be a platform for us to develop new imaging and visualisation techniques and we expect it to revolutionise lung imaging leading to new advances in the study of diseases such as Asthma and Cystic Fibrosis.”

Dr Fouras will present a demonstration of 3D high resolution lung imaging to the Honourable Gordon Rich-Phillips and members of the media at the launch.

Members of the scientific community said the real benefit of the technology lay in its ability to bring scientific research to life, while improving the efficiency of the research process.

The new facility, located at both the Australian Synchrotron and Monash University, will allow scientists in fields covering biomedicine, geoscience, neuroscience, astronomy, engineering and climate studies, to build, analyse and manipulate their own multi-dimensional research data.

MASSIVE is funded by its partners and by both the State Government of Victoria and the National Computational Infrastructure (NCI), which as a national body, was set up to support Australian researchers by creating high-end computing services. The facility will be available to its partners and Australia-wide through the NCI.

Dr Peele said that an upgrade of the Australian Synchrotron’s imaging and medical beamline, set to be completed in April 2011, will capitalise on the technology’s ability to support high resolution CT scans.

For more information on MASSIVE, visit: www.massive.org.au
For more information on the Australian Synchrotron, visit: archive.synchrotron.org.au
For more information on Monash University, visit: www.monash.edu.au
For more information on CSIRO, visit: www.csiro.au
For more information on VPAC, visit: www.vpac.org/

Media contact:
The Australian Synchrotron
Senior Communications Officer
Nicholas Green
03 8540 4289 or 0405 825 181
Nicholas.green@synchrotron.org.au