SCRC Computer Network, Equipment and Software

About our network

The Spinal Cord Research Centre at the University of Manitoba maintains a network of over 110 computer systems, all on the 4th floor of the Basic Medical Sciences Building. About 70 of these nodes are on six thin Ethernet segments which we maintain, and are connected to Ethernet repeaters, owned and operated by the U of M's Information Services and Technology (IST) department, which connect us to the campus backbone network, and ultimately to the Internet. These 6 segments feed our six electrophysiology labs and adjoining offices. The remaining nodes are on segments maintained by IST.

The network is invaluable to our research. We make extensive use of e-mail and FTP to communicate with our collaborators and colleagues around the world. We also use the World Wide Web as a means of accessing the wealth of databases and on-line journals on the net, and to tell the world about ourselves.

About our equipment

Four of our electrophysiology labs rely heavily on Pentium PCs running Linux, and using a UEI PowerDAQ A/D board. These are used for the real-time A/D acquisition and analysis of spinal cord and nerve recordings. These Linux workstations are the only systems that can meet our needs for high volume, continuous A/D sampling. IBM PC compatibles running Windows are used in all six electrophysiology labs for less demanding and/or more specialised A/D capture.

The Linux capture workstations are also backed up by a few more Linux PCs for doing data analysis.

Most of our PCs are equipped with CD or DVD writers to make more permanent copies of our data. We've built up a library of several dozen CD-R discs of experimental data, which is growing weekly. Much of this is also archived on-line on our primary analysis server.

The remaining nodes on our network are dozens of PCs in our labs and offices.

About our software

The key software for our electrophysiology labs is a suite of locally-developed applications for data capture and analysis on the Linux workstations. This software permits high-volume sampling over long periods of time, as required for our locomotion studies. Capturing two intracellular recordings and a dozen ENGs over three or four minutes is not uncommon, sometimes resulting in over 50 megabytes per trial. The software also is geared to very specialised types of analysis - much of it for locomotion studies - but most of it can be applied to a broad range of experiments and recording types.

The analysis side of this custom software also runs on our Linux workstations, all under the X Window system. Software emulators on several of our PCs allow these machines to act as X window terminals, to analyse data on the Linux systems. Our analysis software has also been ported to Mac OS X, running under X11.

An older port of the data capture and analysis software was to the QNX operating system. This system had been used in some of our electrophysiology laboratory, since the autumn of 1996, up until the switch to Linux-based capture systems in 2001. Similar systems (QNX or Linux-based) have since been set up in Montréal, Copenhagen, Kiel (Germany), Göteborg (Sweden), Miami, Phoenix and Atlanta. More information about our data capture and analysis software is available from our fact sheet and our on-line documentation.

For the other laboratory PCs, we use commercial applications such as pClamp, Axotape and AxoScope, from Axon Instruments. A conversion program allows us to import data from these Axon applications into our custom software, for further analysis beyond what these applications allow.

We also use a locally-developed "digital camera" application on some of our lab PCs, to take snapshots of electrical signals on demand. These "snapshots" are brief sweeps, captured by A/D, usually of intracellular recordings from the spinal cord. This replaces our old system of photographing sweeps from an oscilloscope screen, and gives us greater flexibility and precision in making measurements afterwards. Other locally-developed software allows the PCs to control electrical stimulators, or act as digital oscilloscopes.

PCs are also used heavily in the post-analysis phase. We use WordPerfect or Microsoft Word to write our manuscripts, papers and correspondence. Our figures are usually prepared in CorelDRAW, using graphs imported from our analysis software on the QNX and Linux workstations. Virtually all our PCs run Microsoft Windows XP, and a few still run Windows 95 or 98.

The Linux workstations also manage most of the network services we require. A PC running Linux, because of its good uptime and low maintenance cost, is our primary e-mail server for SMTP, IMAP and POP. It is also the DHCP and BOOTP server that assigns IP addresses to all the PCs on our network, and the primary DNS name server for our local domain. After a system upgrade a few years ago, this PC is also our main HTTP server for the web, that is feeding you this page. We use the Apache web server software.

Our e-mail server is also our systems analyst's primary workstation for software development and testing, as well as some everyday use. It sits on his very cluttered desk, and is covered in Post-It notes that continually remind him of all the things he hasn't gotten around to doing.

Another Linux PC acts as secondary DNS name server and backup DHCP server, as well as the primary analysis server.

About the people who make it run

Keeping all this computer network, equipment and software running requires much work on the part of SCRC support staff.

Gilles Detillieux is the systems analyst for the centre. His main duties are the maintenance of the network and the Linux workstations on that network, as well as the development and maintenance of the custom software for data capture and analysis on these workstations. He also does much of the network support for the PCs on the network. Gilles is also the postmaster (and sendmail guru) for the SCRC's e-mail system, and the Web administrator (and HTML/httpd/CGI/htdig guru) for our WWW server.

Matt Ellis is the electronic technician for the centre. His main duties are the construction and maintenance of much of our electronic lab equipment, and the lion's share of the PC support work, including setting up new systems and installing much of the DOS and Windows software we use. Matt has the dubious honour of resolving most of the memory and interrupt problems and conflicts that are all too common on PCs running DOS/Windows, and all the cabling and grounding problems that are all too common in our electrophysiology labs.

SCRC Home Page

SCRC WWW administrator: www@scrc.umanitoba.ca