Ilifu is addressing the need for data-intensive research support in South Africa. It aims to enable South African researchers at the partner organisations to be global pioneers in the strategic science domains of astronomy and bioinformatics and simultaneously promote human capital development in these sectors.

In addition to establishing and operating a data-intensive computing facility, the consortium has – in collaboration with local and international collaborators and partners – undertaken research and development programmes for:

• Proto-typing a distributed, federated cloud-based infrastructure as a platform for data-intensive research.
• Data-processing pipelines and eResearch tools for big-data analysis, visualisation and analytics.
• Research data management systems and tools.
• Platforms, portals and middleware to support access and collaborative research by distributed teams on data-intensive projects.