Once you’ve registered and arrive in New Orleans, be sure to use our mobile web app to manage your busy schedule so you don’t miss a thing. Also check the website for updates and use the #PEARC17 hashtag to keep up with friends and colleagues.
Structural biology is in the midst of a revolution. Instrumentation and software improvements have allowed for the full realization of cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) as a tool capable of determining atomic structures of protein and macromolecular samples. These advances open the door for solving new structures that were previously unattainable, which will soon make cryo-EM a ubiquitous tool for structural biology worldwide, serving both academic and commercial purposes. However, despite its power, new users to cryo-EM face significant obstacles. One major barrier consists of the handling of large datasets (10+ terabytes), where new cryo-EM users must learn how to interface with the Linux command line while also dealing with managing and submitting jobs to high performance computing resources. To address this barrier, we are developing the COSMIC2 Science Gateway as an easy, web-based, science gateway to simplify cryo-EM data analysis using a standardized workflow to run on XSEDE’s (Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment) supercomputers. This gateway will lower the barrier to high performance computing tools and facilitate the growth of cryo-EM to become a routine tool for structural biology. With the support of XSEDE’s Extended Collaborative Support Services (ECSS) and the Science Gateway Community Institute’s (SGCI) Extended Developer Support (EDS), we have adapted the successful Cyberinfrastructure for Phylogenetic Research (CIPRES) Workbench to the cryo-EM analysis workflow and are in the process of adding Globus Auth and Globus Transfer to enable the transfer of hundreds of gigabytes to several terabytes of data for analysis at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC).
