Center for Research in Systems and Storage

University of California, Santa Cruz

Scope: The primary focus of CRSS is the research into advanced storage systems using combinations of new technologies and advanced algorithms to improve the usability, performance, scalability, security, and reliability of information storage.

Center Mission and Rationale

The Center for Research in Systems and Storage (CRSS) is a partnership between universities and industry to explore and develop new technologies and techniques to improve the usability, scalability, security, reliability, and performance of storage systems. CRSS features high-quality, industrially relevant fundamental research, strong industrial support of collaboration in research and education, and direct transfer of university developed ideas, research results, and technology to U.S. industry to improve its competitive posture in world markets. Through innovative education of talented graduate and undergraduate students, CRSS is providing the next generation of scientists and engineers with a broad, industrially oriented perspective on engineering research and practice.

CRSS provides the means for industry and government partners to leverage research and development (R&D) investments with multi-university centers renowned for their innovative research capabilities, while catalyzing discoveries that form the basis for new technologies, stressing partnerships and collaborative research with universities, foundations, private industry, and other federal agencies. The Center is established in a university with strong ties to the storage system industry: Silicon Valley has long been a center of the storage industry in the United States. Research projects in the Center are supported by industrial members, and the Center encourages frequent participation by industry employees in the projects: participation in weekly meetings via phone call, email discussions, and face-to-face meetings. The Center encourages students to engage member companies via summer internships, facilitating technology transfer and building strong ties that can result in full-time employment after graduation. CRSS was established as an NSF I/UCRC in 2013, but it inherits a long legacy of storage systems research from UC Santa Cruz's Storage Systems Research Center and participation in the NSF I/UCRC Center for Research in Intelligent Storage.

Research Program

The Center for Research in Systems and Storage explores a wide range of topics in advanced storage system design, including the following:

  • Next-generation non-volatile memory systems (flash, byte-addressable NVM)
  • Very large-scale long-term archival storage systems
  • Network-attached and object-based storage systems
  • File system naming, storage, and search
  • Scalable high-performance storage
  • Performance optimization

Within these focus areas, CRSS research is exploring the impact of cross-cutting issues such as:

  • Rewriting the system stack for byte-addressable non-volatile memory
  • Integrity and persistence through failures for non-volatile memory
  • System support for QLC flash memory
  • Adaptive techniques using machine learning to manage storage systems
  • Security and accountability in storage
  • Storage system reliability
  • The use of metadata and indexing to facilitate file system search and naming
  • Modeling archival storage systems

Current research projects are listed at the CRSS Web site.

Special Center Activities

The Center sponsors a regular series of seminars on current research topics. These seminars are given by Center researchers (typically faculty and students) and outside researchers, and are available to sponsors for both in-person attendance and remote attendance via video teleconference.

Facilities and Laboratories

The Center has facilities at the University of California, Santa Cruz. In addition, the Center maintains a presence at the University of California's Silicon Valley Center. The Center's facilities include several small to medium size compute clusters, testbeds for experimentation with disk-based and NVRAM-based storage, and access to the PlanetLab global-scale testbed.

More information

The CRSS membership agreement and current bylaws are available for prospective members to review.

Membership documents

Contact Information

Center for Research in Systems and Storage
Jack Baskin School of Engineering
Engineering 2 Building, Room 595
1156 High Street
Santa Cruz, CA 95064
+1 (831) 459-2817
URL: http://www.crss.ucsc.edu/

Center Sites

University of California, Santa Cruz

Last modified 20 Nov 2023