Datasets from Synchrotron experiments can be in the order of 10’s to 100’s of gigabits. Thompson says he has found the AARNet FileSender service very useful on numerous occasions for shifting these large datasets to people located interstate or overseas who do not have access to CSIRO’s internal systems. He also uses CloudStor to send data to colleagues in different sections of CSIRO when there is no common storage.

Thompson’s software work supports scientists using the Australian Synchrotron from a number of research fields, including medical and life sciences, earth and environmental sciences, advanced materials and engineering, and accelerator sciences. Synchrotron X-rays are used for measuring hard-to-detect quantities or properties, observing physically hidden features, or stimulating atomic and molecular processes that require a lot of energy, and other applications.

He is also a researcher, working in the field of CT mammography using Synchrotron datasets for his own investigations, exploring 3D X-ray CT combined with phase-contrast imaging techniques with the aim of improving the accuracy of breast cancer diagnostic imaging.

“Generally, over the course of their beam-time a Synchrotron user will acquire many such input datasets resulting in several terabytes of input data alone. If they process the data with the onsite MASSIVE HPC system this will increase even more. Interestingly – CT reconstruction produces output datasets even bigger than the input,” he says.

After the experiments are complete this data often needs to be moved offsite.

“AARNet’s FileSender is proving to be a reliable way to bulk move this experiment data to people who haven’t be able get their data via other methods.”

CloudStor has been built for the research community and is a quick, easy and free way to transfer large files. Researchers and other users at AARNet-connected universities can access CloudStor using Australian Access Federation credentials.

More information

Find out more about the benefits of AARNet’s CloudStor FileSender and storage service, including 100GB free storage for researchers and group quotas for projects.