Abstract: To enable new kinds of scientific discovery and translation related to the newly emerged COVID-19 pandemic, we are requesting a new high-performance instrument with large shared memory nodes. The COVID and Translational Science (CATS) supercomputer, will support over $120 million in 50 research projects for 46 PIs. Due to the urgent need for improved understanding, diagnosis, treatment and prevention of COVID-19, related projects are very time-sensitive in the near-term. CATS will also be utilized for a spectrum of translational science applications from molecular dynamic simulations leading towards drug discovery and multi-scale analyses incorporating omic, electronic medical record data and images. Even after the pandemic is better controlled, research will continue for years on the post-COVID-19 syndrome due to its complex invasion on multiple organ systems. Other disease areas needing CATS include psychiatric disease, asthma, Down syndrome, myocarditis, Dengue fever and brain cancer. In total, CATS will contain with 2,640 Intel cores, 82 TB of memory and 16 petabytes of storage. The enhanced capabilities of CATS will shorten the time to solution and enable more complex biomedical analyses.

Narrative: COVID-19 has transformed life around the world. To improve understanding, diagnosis, treatment and prevention of this and other diseases, we propose the COVID and Translational Science supercomputer (CATS). This high-performance instrument will be embedded in a data-rich ecosystem, and will provide an essential foundation for scientific discovery.