The National Science Foundation (NSF) has entered into an agreement with the government of Arkansas and the University of Arkansas (U of A) to establish a cloud-based data analytics network to support academic research initiatives.
The five-year grant comes as part of NSF’s Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR) effort and earmarks $20 million to help develop the Arkansas Research Platform, the U of A said Monday. The grant adds to the U of A's $4 million in funding from the state for the Data Analytics That Are Robust and Trusted (DART) program which also includes eight other academic entities.
Participants will integrate their high-performance computing assets for the proposed research platform, which will be used to support artificial intelligence and machine learning studies. The platform is also intended to process massive amounts of data to address key program priorities under NSF and the U of A, the university noted.
"The DART project embodies the full spirit of convergence research NSF has been supporting during the past five years," said Dan Sui, vice chancellor for research and innovation at the U of A. “This project will have far-reaching impacts in Arkansas and beyond for generations to come."
The DART effort is slated to take place from July 1 through June 2025.
