SDSC National Data Platform release 2026-08-10 (web)
Citation
Kimberly Mann Bruch, San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC). “National Data Platform Receives NSF Category I Award to Expand AI-Ready Data Infrastructure for U.S.” News release, Aug. 10, 2026. https://www.sdsc.edu/news/2026/PR20260810-NDP.html. Read 2026-11-09.
Bottom line
- The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) gave the National Data Platform (NDP) a five-year, $24.5 million Cooperative Agreement, NSF award no. 2609447.
- UC San Diego leads the project from SDSC. Its partners are the University of Utah, UMass Amherst, the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) and the University of Washington.
Background
SDSC published this release on its news site. The award is one of two Category I projects under the NSF Integrated Data Systems and Services (IDSS) program. The release quotes NSF, the UC San Diego Chancellor, the principal investigator and four co-principal investigators. It lists the existing systems that the NDP builds on and the five components of the platform.
Key claims
- “The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded the National Data Platform (NDP) a five-year, $24.5 million Cooperative Agreement to build a federated, AI-ready national data ecosystem” (first paragraph)
- “The award is one of two Category I projects announced on July 22, 2026, under NSF’s new Integrated Data Systems and Services (IDSS) program, part of an $83 million, agency-wide investment in national data infrastructure” (body)
- “The UC San Diego team is based at the Halıcıoğlu School of Data Science and Computing San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) and will work in partnership with researchers from the University of Utah, the University of Massachusetts Amherst, the Texas Advanced Computing Center at The University of Texas at Austin and the University of Washington’s eScience Institute.” (body)
- “The platform is organized as a layered, federated microservices architecture built on open standards, shared operational principles and community governance.” (About the Project)
- “Ilkay Altintas, chief data science officer at SDSC, will serve as principal investigator (PI) of the project” (About the Project)
- “The project will run from July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2031 and is funded by NSF (award no. 2609447).” (Looking Ahead)
Evidence and method
An institutional news release on a federal award. It gives the amount, the term, the award number and the partner institutions. It lists the systems the project builds on:
- the National Research Platform (NRP);
- Tapis;
- CloudBank;
- the Redtail AI Factory at the University of Utah;
- the Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center.
It names five components: the Compute Fabric, the Federation Fabric, the Innovation Factory, the Service Gallery and the Portal.
Limits
The release does not split the $24.5 million among the partners or by year. It does not say who can use the NDP, or how users get access or pay. It does not name the other Category I project. It names the National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource (NAIRR) in a quotation but does not describe a link between the NDP and NAIRR.