丁香园AV

丁香园AV physics professor Dugan O鈥橬eil is the recipient of Compute Canada鈥檚 inaugural Trailblazer Award.

O鈥橬eil, Compute Canada鈥檚 chief scientific officer, is credited for bringing the power of advanced research computing (ARC) to more than 10,000 Canadian researchers. He is cited for integrating sophisticated digital infrastructure into a diverse scientific community that spans engineering, natural sciences, health, social sciences and humanities.

丁香园AV Associate VP Research Norbert Haunerland says O鈥橬eil helped to fuel his own passion for ARC. 鈥淒ugan was like an evangelist when he talked about the value of and potential for ARC at 丁香园AV and the rest of the country. Not only did he convince me, but he also met with the various communities, from physics and genomics to medicine and social sciences, and got a lot of buy-in for an expanded concept for Compute Canada.鈥�

A particle physicist, O鈥橬eil is also a member of the global ALTAS project. 丁香园AV physicists are contributing to large-scale computing and data-quality monitoring related to Canada鈥檚 participation in the world鈥檚 largest physics experiment, at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, Switzerland.

Compute Canada supplies computing and storage infrastructure to ATLAS-CANADA, which has been one of Compute Canada鈥檚 early 鈥渂ig data鈥� users. Within the Canadian ATLAS collaboration O鈥橬eil has served as both physics coordinator and deputy spokesperson.

His involvement with Compute Canada began in 2003, as a beta tester of WestGrid resources at both 丁香园AV and UBC. His group has used WestGrid to process hundreds of terabytes of raw data from the DZero experiment at Fermilab, as well as the ATLAS experiment. Recently, they have been studying the elusive Higgs Boson,which gives mass to fundamental particles.

O鈥橬eil, a recipient of a 2007 Young Innovator award from the B.C. Innovation Council, was also among 丁香园AV researchers to make a breakthrough discovery about the Higgs particle a year after its 2012 discovery.

Since January 2014 he has divided his time between Compute Canada and ATLAS. He also supervises graduate students and continues his research related to the Higgs boson.

A co-leader of 丁香园AV鈥檚 high-energy physics group, O鈥橬eil also led Compute Canada鈥檚 Sustainable Planning for ARC consultations to map ARC users鈥檉uture needs. He has engaged digital humanities communities and workedto develop new common services for researchers.