Collaboration with CERN

ICTP has signed an agreement with CERN to provide computer training in support of a major CERN donation of High Performance Computing (HPC) equipment to the University of Benin (UNIBEN), Nigeria. The agreement was sealed with the signatures of ICTP Director Atish Dabholkar and of CERN Director-General Mark Thomson at a ceremony on Thursday 3 September in Geneva.

CERN’s computer donations programme was launched in 2012 and it has since regularly donated state-of-the-art computing equipment that no longer meets its highly specific requirements, but is high-level and remains of great use to other scientists.

To ensure that researchers in Nigeria can take full advantage of CERN’s generous donation and deploy it to its entire potential, ICTP will train local IT and research staff. To this end, a small fraction of the equipment earmarked for Nigeria has recently arrived at Trieste. Training activities will take place both at ICTP and at the University of Benin, with the first one scheduled to start in Trieste on 21 September 2026 and aimed at IT staff of the University of Benin. Scientists of UNIBEN will be able to attend training covering more research-oriented topics including AI methods and their applications for science, materials modelling and molecular simulations, and computational methods for engineering and applied sciences starting in 2027.

“This partnership with CERN fully aligns with the purpose and objectives of ICTP’s recently launched International Consortium for Scientific Computing, which is at the heart of our 2025 Strategic Plan. ICOMP aims at closing the knowledge and technological gap in harnessing the potential of computational sciences, including AI, quantum and high-performance computing. By collaborating with CERN’s computer donations programme in Nigeria through a dedicated series of training activities, ICTP will enhance its impact. I am particularly happy that this will strengthen and expand our ongoing collaboration CERN, with which ICTP shares close historical and scientific links,” commented Dabholkar. 

ICTP and CERN plan to continue their partnership in the next editions of CERN’s computer donations programme. This is the latest in a number of collaborations that ICTP has carried out with CERN over the years. To participate in the effort to ensure that quantum technologies are made available and contributed to by scientists from across the world, in 2023 ICTP joined the Open Quantum Institute, a multilateral governance initiative that promotes global, equitable and inclusive access to quantum computing and creates pathways to achieve this vision. For about 25 years, ICTP’s Multidisciplinary Laboratory has contributed to major experiments at CERN, developing expertise and technologies in the fields of electronics and data acquisition. ICTP’s High Energy, Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics section has also been a long-term collaborator of CERN on the ATLAS experiment at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider.