Prof. Richard O. Sinnott's Home Page

Contact Details

Postal Address:
- 234b Kelvin Building
  National e-Science Centre
  University of Glasgow
  Glasgow G12 8QQ
  United Kingdom
Telephone: +44-(0)141-330-8606
Fax: +44-(0)141-330-8625
Email: r.sinnott AT nesc dot gla dot ac dot uk

For information on how to get the National e-Science Centre at the University of Glasgow, please see http://www.gla.ac.uk/general/maps.

Teaching

At Glasgow I have lectured on Grid Computing and on Modelling Reactive Systems. The Grid computing module was one of the first full modules offered in the UK and explores latest Grid technologies such as Globus toolkit version 4, OGSA-DAI, Condor, PERMIS, Shibboleth and GridSphere. In the Modelling Reactive Systems course I provided an introduction to Specification and Desciption Language (SDL), Message Sequence Charts (MSC) and Testing and Test Control Notation (TTCN-3) and the issues in their usage for real-time systems development. These days I no longer have direct teaching commitments but instead spend my time juggling the numerous projects I am involved in (see below) and writing further grants.

I currently supervise several PhD students in the areas of:

Grid security in the clinical domain (Oluwafemi Ajayi) - successfully completed June 2009;
Grid-based Fabric Management and Trusted Computing (Jan Muhammad);
Grids in the Electronics Domain (Gordon Stewart);
Workflows and data provenance in the social science domain (Sardar Hussain).

I have also supervised numerous advanced MSc and other student dissertations (MSc, UG etc).

Projects

I am involved in several on-going e-Science projects fulfilling a variety of roles at Glasgow including:

National e-Science Centre (NeSC)
- principal investigator and board member of the National e-Science Centre at Glasgow University
Dynamic Virtual Organisations for e-Science Education (DyVOSE) project
- principal investigator on the JISC funded Dynamic Virtual Organisations for e-Science Education (DyVOSE) project
Grid Enabled Microarray Expression Profile Search (GEMEPS)
- principal investigator on the BBSRC funded Grid Enabled Microarray Expression Profile Search (GEMEPS) project
Glasgow early adoption of Shibboleth (GLASS)
- principal investigator on the JISC funded Glasgow early adoption of Shibboleth (GLASS) project
e-Science Data, Information and Knowledge Transfer (eDIKT) project
- board member of the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council (SHEFC) funded EDIKT project
Virtual Organisations for Trials and Epidemiological Studies (VOTES) project
- systems architect and co-applicant on the MRC funded Virtual Organisations for Trials and Epidemiological Studies (VOTES) project
Scottish Bioinformatics Research Network (SBRN)
- technical manager of the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council (SHEFC), Scottish Enterprise (SE), Scottish Executive Environment and Rural Affairs Deparment (SEERAD) funded Scottish Bioinformatics Research Network (SBRN) project
Biomedical Research Informatics Delivered by Grid Enabled Services (BRIDGES) project
- project manager on the DTI funded Biomedical Research Informatics Delivered by Grid Enabled Services (BRIDGES) project
Generation Scotland Scottish Family Health Study
- co-investigator on the CSO funded Generation Scotland Scottish Family Health Study
Joint Data Standards Survey (JDSS)
- consultant on the MRC, BBSRC, JISC, NERC, DTI, Wellcome Trust funded Joint Data Standards Survey (JDSS) project
ESP-Grid project
- acting consultant and co-investigator on the JISC funded ESP-Grid project
OGC Collision project
- acting consultant on the JISC funded Grid and Open Geospatial Consortium Collision project with EDINA
OMII-Security Portlets project
- principal investigator on the OMII-UK funded Open Middleware Infrastructure Institute UK - Security Portlets (OMII-SP) project
OMII-RAVE project
- acting consultant on the OMII-UK funded Open Middleware Infrastructure Institute UK - Resource Aware Visualisation Environment (OMII-RAVE) project with WeSC
Meeting the Design Challenges of nanoCMOS Electronics
- Co-investigator and technical manager of the EPSRC funded nanoCMOS pilot project
Grid Enabled Occupational Data Environment (GEODE) project
- acting consultant on the ESRC funded Grid Enabled Occupational Data Environment (GEODE) project
Towards an e-Infrastructure for e-Science Digital Repositories
- consultant on the EU funded project with the Digital Archiving Consultancy
Integrating VOMS and PERMIS for Superior Grid Authorization (VPAuthZ) project
- co-investigator on the JISC funded Integrating VOMS and PERMIS for Superior Grid Authorisation project with the University of Kent
Data Management through e-Social Science (DAMES) project
- co-investigator on the ESRC funded DAMES project with the University of Stirling
Investigation of the molecular pathogenesis and pathophysiology of Disorders of Sex Development (EuroDSD) project
- co-investigator and platform delivery manager on this large EU funded multi-site collaboration
Advanced Arterial Hypotension Adverse Event prediction through a Novel Bayesian Network (AVERT-IT) project
- co-investigator and technology provider on this large EU funded multi-site collaboration
Advanced Grid Authorisation through Semantic Technologies (AGAST) project
- investigator on the JISC funded Advanced Grid Authorisation through Semantic Technologies (AGAST) (AGAST) project
National e-Science Centre Research Platform Grant (NRP)
- Principle Investigator at Glasgow on the EPSRC funded NRP project
National e-Science Centre Information Networking Grant (NIN)
- Principle Investigator at Glasgow on the EPSRC funded NIN project
Shib-Grid Integrated Authorisation (ShinTau) project
- co-investigator on the JISC funded Shib-Grid Integrated with Authorisation (ShinTau) (ShinTau) project
Scottish Health Informatics Platform (SHIP) project
- co-investigator on the Wellcome Trust funded Scottish Health Informatics Platform (SHIP) project
Pharming of Therapeutic RNA (siRNA) project
- co-investigator on the Scottish Intermediary Technology Institute funded Pharming of Therapeutic RNA (siRNA) project
National Centre for e-Social Science (NCeSS) project
- technical manager of the NCeSS funded e-Infrastructure Project (e-IP) project
National e-Infrastructure for Social Simulation (NeISS) project
- co-investigator on the JISC funded National e-Infrastructure for Social Simulation (NeISS) project
Enhancing Repositories for Language and Literature Researchers (ENROLLER) project
- co-investigator on the JISC funded Enhancing Repositories for Language and Literature Researchers (ENROLLER) project
European Network for the Study of Adrenal Tumours project
- co-investigator on the European Science Foundation (ESF) funded ENSAT databases (ENSAT) project
Proxy Credential Auditing project
- co-investigator on the JISC funded A Proxy Credential Auditing Infrastructure for the UK e-Science National Grid Service project

Publications

Some of my publications are available in the departmental bibliography database. Please send me an email if you would like a copy of any of these. Alternatively you may find many papers in the Glasgow ENLIGHTEN repository.

External Affiliations

I am involved in numerous conferences and fulfil several roles externally to the university. The more recent of these include:

Journals and Conference Programme Committees

Life Science Grid (2004, 2005, 2006) - chair in 2007
UK e-Science All Hands Meeting 2003/2004/2005/2006/2007/2008/2009
Self-Organization and Adaptation of Multi-agent and Grid Systems (SOAS) 2005/2006/2007
Digital Curation Conference 2006
International Workshop on Distributed, High-Performance and Grid Computing in Computational Biology 2007
IEEE Grid Conference 2006/2007
IEEE e-Science and Grid Conference 2006/2007
IEEE Transactions on Information Technology in Biomedicine
IEEE International Symposium on Parallel Systems and Applications
IEEE Distributed Systems Online
International Conference on Availability, Reliability and Security (ARES) 2006/2007
Health Informatics Journal Editorial Board
International Journal of Digital Curation

International Committees/Panels - I have on occasion been asked to sit on review boards for various international e-Science efforts including:

the Irish Research Council for the Science and Engineering Technology;
the Norwegian e-Research international review committee;
the Malaysian MYREN international review committee;
the Singapore National e-Infrastructure Committee.

Research Council Proposal Reviewer - I have on occasion reviewed proposals for a variety of research councils including:

the Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC);
the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC);
the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC);
the Economic and Social Sciences Research Council (ESRC);
the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC);
the Medical Research Council (MRC);
the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC);
the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC);

I am acting chair of the Global Grid Forum OGSA-DAI User Group and am involved in the UK e-Science Security Task Force; the Engineering Task Force; the EPSRC User Group; the Open Middleware Infrastructure Institute (OMII) User Group. I am on the UK e-Science Directors board and also on the GridNet2 review panel. I am on the local steering committee for the Digital Curation Centre at the University of Glasgow.

Background Information

I am a Professorial Research Fellow and the Technical Director of the National e-Science Centre (NeSC) at the University of Glasgow and Deputy Director (Technical) of the Bioinformatics Research Centre at Glasgow. I am responsible for establishing an environment for e-Science at Glasgow University. This includes provision of the necessary computational infrastructure and the training and education of future e-Scientists.

I have a BSc in Theoretical Physics from the University of East Anglia where I spent a long time running Fortran 77 based Monte-Carlo simulations of linear polymers (e-Science before we called it e-Science). I spent a couple of years travelling around the US and Central America, before returning to the UK to undertake an MSc in Software Engineering at the University of Stirling where I did my dissertation specifing and validating families of electronic components (from basic flip-flops to binary bucket brigades). I ended up doing my PhD in Stirling on applying formal languages (LOTOS and Z) for the architectural driven specification of distributed systems. I was editor of a couple of international standards during this period (Architectural Semantics of Open Distributed Processing (Part2: Foundations and Part 3: Architecture). I'm not sure if anyone ever used these much mind...! ;o(

After working for a couple of years in Germany at GMD Fokus, I set up and ran my own consultancy company specialising in the area of formal technologies and their application to real time systems development, especially in the telecommunications domain. I still maintain an interest in formal methods and their application to real time, distributed systems development.

These days, my work is focused around Grid computing using technologies such as the Globus Toolkit and its application to a broad spectrum of scientific areas - life sciences being one exemplar. I am especially interested in security aspects associated with Grid technology. Many of the projects I am involved in are especially concerned about security issues since they deal with patient data sets for example. At NeSC in Glasgow we have focused on advanced authorisation infrastructures such as PERMIS and are currently exploring the Shibboleth technologies.

I have published extensively in a wide variety of areas from theoretical computing science, telecommunications, real time systems and more recently on Grid technologies, security and their application to the life science domain.

I am (or used to be when I had more time) interested in sports. I have been known to play squash and golf at a reasonable level, and have done a couple of marathons in my time. I try - when my children allow!!! - to play guitar. I also still follow my home team.

Secure Links

The secure part of this page can be access here.

Last updated 16th December 2009.