HPC

Access to Dawn

AI Research Resource, a UK national facility providing specialised compute capacity

The Dawn supercomputer is made up of 1,024 Intel Data Centre GPU Max 1550 GPUs. 

Together with Isambard-AI at the University of Bristol, Dawn is a part of the AI Research Resource, a UK national facility providing specialised compute capacity to:

  • public researchers
  • academia
  • small and medium size enterprises

Two access routes are currently available:

  • Rapid Access
  • Gateway

Additional routes for larger-scale projects will be introduced as the AIRR service evolves.

To be eligible, all projects must:

  • be conducted in the UK
  • aim to deliver benefits within the UK.

Rapid Access

Open to UK-registered micro, small and medium organisations, this route supports early-stage development of AI products prior to market launch.

Eligible activities include:

  • feasibility studies
  • industrial research
  • experimental development

Resources available:

  • Up to 20,000 GPU hours on AIRR services, to be used within 3 months of project start.

Read further guidance provided by UKRI on the Rapid Access route.

Gateway

Designed for researchers from academia, industry, or other UK organisations, this route supports:

  • first-time users of AI supercomputing resources
  • testing of (novel) algorithms, code, and workflows
  • benchmarking of algorithms, code, and workflows before applying for larger AIRRopportunities

Eligible activities include:

  • fundamental research (Research organisations only)
  • feasibility studies
  • industrial research
  • experimental development

Resources available:

  • Up to 10,000 GPU hours on AIRR services, to be used within 3 months of project start.

Read further guidance provided by UKRI on the Gateway route.

Apply via the AIRRPortal

You can use the AIRRPortal to apply to use AIRR.

Contact airr@ukri.org to ask for guidance.

Read the AIRRPortal - Privacy policy.