SD2E began as the DARPA SD2 program Environment for enabling advanced scientific modeling and computation. The Synergistic Discovery and Design (SD2) program focused on developing data-based approaches for accelerating scientific discovery and the design of robust models in new domains of research. More information on SD2 can be found at: https://www.darpa.mil/program/synergistic-discovery-and-design.

SD2E served SD2 and other related data-driven scientific programs.  SD2E consisted of a web-portal; a web-based research workbench, a RESTful APIs (Tapis) and function-as-a-service (Abaco) linking computational applications and workflows with command line access and control via web-portal; high performance advanced computational and data storage hardware; and the skilled personnel supporting scientists in their use of the computational resources.  Additional tools incorporated into SD2E included JupyterHub, Gitlab, Jenkins, Redash, and Synbiohub. Access control to data and software was maintained at multiple levels, allowing private user-only access during initial testing, followed by project level shared access, and finally publishing capabilities.

SD2E was managed by the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC), where many of the world’s most powerful research computing resources are designed and operated.  More information on TACC resources can be found at: https://www.tacc.utexas.edu.