The Computing Insight UK 2025 exhibition will be open on Thursday 4th and Friday 5th December at Manchester Central. There is a set-up day on Wednesday 3rd December (between 8am and 5pm) and all exhibits MUST be set-up on this day. We do not allow setting up in the exhibition during the conference on 4th and 5th December.

How to register:

Step 1 – register your company here.

Select CIUK 2025 Exhibitor as your registration type and you will be directed to the exhibitor registration path.

Register you company as normal. Exhibition staff can be registered in step 2.

Step 2 – register your exhibition staff here.

Select CIUK 2025 Delegate as your registration type and you will be directed to the delegate registration path.

Select the registration type ‘Exhibition Staff’ when prompted.

You should have received a discount code for the free entry of 3 of your staff in your company registration confirmation email. Redeem the discount by entering the code at on the payment page.

As with previous years we have five different exhibitor packages available – Standard, Platinum, Gold, Silver and Bronze. Each package includes different options. You can download a copy of the package information sheet from here and you will select your package via the online registration form.

During registration you will also select your stand. A copy of the floorplan is available here for reference . If your preferred stand is not showing as an option on the form when you register then it has already been selected by another company.

Payment of exhibitor fees can be made by credit card at the time you submit your registration or we can send you an invoice. If you choose the invoice option then you MUST upload a purchase order when you register. We cannot issue an invoice without a relevant PO.

Any questions should be directed to the conference mailbox – CIUK@stfc.ac.uk. The main contact for the CIUK exhibition is Georgia Lomas.

We look forward to welcoming you back to Manchester Central in December.

The CIUK Exhibitor manual for 2025 can now be found here.

​The CIUK exhibition is covered by our conference Terms and Conditions. These include the cancellation policy for the event that will be adhered to at all times with one exception. By submitting your registration to exhibit you are confirming your acceptance of these Terms and Conditions.

Sterling Event Group​ will be providing AV support for CIUK 2025. They can also provide exhibitors with equipment such as screens, laptops, iPads, PA systems and microphones. Download an order form here​. All completed forms to be returned to Sterling at exhibitions@sterlingeventgroup.co.uk​. If you need equipment not listed on the order form please contact Sterling directly on 0161 436 4444 to discuss your requirements.

As with last year, badge scanners are available for hire to all exhibitors. Full details are available here. 

The programme for CIUK 2025 is now available to download here.

Please note that we will be taking photos during the event and will be recording presentations to add to our CIUK YouTube playlist. If selected to present and you prefer not to be featured in event photos or videos please let a member of the organising team on the registration desk know.

Abstract: AlphaFold is a ground-breaking deep learning-based method for prediction of the structure of proteins and biomolecular systems. Its development exemplifies how the patient acquisition of high-quality data, in this case archived by the PDB, can enable disruptive scientific innovation. The landscape of protein structure research, both experimental and computational, changed rapidly with the arrival of AlphaFold; some approaches and workflows have become largely obsolete, while other areas have seen more intense efforts and rapid progress, often using methods inspired by AlphaFold. This talk will try to present an overview and comparison of biology pre- and post-Alphafold, with an emphasis on the role of UK research communities and scientific computation.

Bio: Dan trained as a Biochemist in Oxford then dabbled in protein structure modelling in its infancy during a PhD in Edinburgh. Time in Leeds and Brasilia was spent doing protein X-ray crystallography alongside bioinformatics, but increasingly gravitating towards the latter. He returned to the UK in 2003 to take up a position as Lecturer in Bioinformatics at the University of Liverpool and has been there ever since. Much of that time has been spent considering how bioinformatics innovations can be translated to benefit communities of experimental structural biologists, especially protein crystallographers through ties with CCP4. Latterly this has entailed adapting to the many opportunities and occasional challenges of the post-AlphaFold world.

Due to the success of previous years we will be, once again, including a pre-CIUK Day Zero on Wednesday 3 December in the programme for CIUK 2025. Events included on Day Zero are included in your registration fees unless indicated otherwise.

The main event on CIUK 2025 Day Zero will be the annual CoSeC Conference. This event will take place in Exchange Room 9-11, upstairs at Manchester Central and will start at 10:00. Full details can be found on their website.

We will also be including two breakout sessions on Day Zero. Both of these sessions will take place in Exchange Rooms 1-2, upstairs in Manchester Central…

• The first session will be the annual HPC-SIG / SysAdmin Technical Meetup, organised by Simon Atack (Birmingham University). This session will run from 13:00-16:00.
• The second session will be a “DRI Cybersecurity” session organised by David Crooks (UKRI-STFC). This session will run from 16:00-17:30.

Running alongside the CIUK 2025 Day Zero activities, we are also happy to support the Lustre UK User Group. This annual meeting that is traditionally run in conjunction with CIUK will take place in the Midland Hotel, adjacent to Manchester Central, starting at 13:00. Please note: separate registration is required for this event via the LUG UK website.

• Understanding the dRTP Landscape – Thursday 4th December – 9:30-11:00 – Exchange Rooms 9-11
• FAIRifying the dRTP Training Ecosystem – Thursday 4th December – 11:30-13:00 – Exchange Rooms 9-11
• Public Engagement activities you could deliver at your institution, and knowledge sharing and networking session! – Thursday 4th December – 14:00-15:30 – Exchange Rooms 9-11
• Women in HPC Breakfast – Friday 5th December – 8:30-10:30 – Exchange Rooms 9-11

We are delighted to be organising the 4th annual WHPC breakfast at CIUK 2025! This year, the popular event will be taking place on the 5th of December between 8:30 and 10:30. We are bringing the HPC community together for:

• Inspiring early-career tech talks
• Introductions to the UK’s WHPC Chapter & Affiliate community
• Networking with peers and colleagues
• A relaxed start to the day with breakfast provided

For more information and to apply for a lightning talk please click here.

• GPFS User Group CIUK 2025 – Friday 5th December – 11:30-13:30 – Exchange Rooms 9-11
• From ExCALIBUR to DRI, linking the UK’s compute programmes – Friday 5th December – 14:00-16:00 – Exchange Rooms 9-11

A NEW LOOK CLUSTER CHALLENGE FOR CIUK 2025… over recent years we have seen massive growth in the CIUK cluster challenge. From 3 teams in our first competition to 16 teams last year the challenge is proving to be very popular amongst University students. We have now become victims of our own success and the previous format of the competition is no longer sustainable. So we are making some positive changes…

The CIUK2025 Cluster Challenge will see the introduction of a qualifying round. We are partnering with three Universities – The University of Edinburgh, UCL and Durham University. These Universities will be hosting a series of online challenges for the teams. Team members will also be required to complete the ARCHER2 driving test before commencing the challenges.

At the conclusion of these online challenges the top 8 teams will qualify to attend CIUK2025 at Manchester Central in December, with all travel and accommodation costs covered by CIUK. Once at CIUK2025 the qualified teams will complete a series of in-person challenges working with our partner companies Alces Flight and OCF as in previous years to crown the overall CIUK2025 Cluster Challenge Champions 🏆

Our champion team will then go forward to represent CIUK in the online version of the ISC’26 cluster challenge competition in June 2026.

Not sure what the cluster challenge is all about? Check out this video from last years competition… https://youtu.be/uY6dEjFeOMo?si=nEAICZ2Q4zh99GIY.

IMPORTANT DATES

• Deadline for applications 10am on Friday 3 October
• Selected teams confirmed on Monday 6 October
• ARCHER2 Driving Test to be completed before Friday 10 October
• Challenge materials (x3 – 1x EPCC, 1x Durham, 1x UCL) sent out Monday 13 October
• Challenges x3 to be completed by Friday 31 October
• Team presentations between Monday 3 and Friday 7 November
• Qualified teams confirmed by Wednesday 12 November
• Teams travel to Manchester Wednesday 3 December
• In-Person challenges at Manchester Thursday 4 and Friday 5 December (treasure hunt Thursday am, 1x challenge Thursday pm Alces, 1x challenge Friday am OCF)
• Winning team announced Friday 5 December pm

NOTE: the cluster challenge is limited to undergraduate and postgraduate students from “taught degree courses”. There is also a limit of 2 teams per institution.

In 2019 we lost an incredibly important member of the CIUK Scientific Advisory Committee with the sudden and unexpected passing of Jacky Pallas at the age of just 54. Jacky was head of e-Research at King’s College London and for the previous three years had been an active and vocal member of the CIUK Scientific Advisory Committee, helping to shape the direction our event has taken and pushing through many positive changes, whilst championing diversity and the inclusion of young researchers.

In her memory, and in recognition of her passion for our conference, we introduced an annual award that will highlight the high impact work of an early career researcher and will allow the award winner a slot in the main programme at CIUK.  Researchers will be nominated by their supervisors and we are looking for nominations that highlight the impact of a project that early career researchers have been working on, or have completed.

We are very proud to announce the winner of this year’s award is Flaviano Della Pia from the University of Cambridge, Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry.

Flaviano is from Naples, Italy, where he graduated in Condensed Matter Physics. He recently completed his PhD in Computational Chemistry at the University of Cambridge, where his work explored theoretical and computational approaches to understanding materials and molecular systems.

Computational modelling plays a central role in molecular crystal discovery, fundamental to a wide range of applications, including pharmaceuticals and renewable energy. However, a reliable description of these systems requires both a high-accuracy description of the potential energy surface and a fully anharmonic hashtag#quantum description of the hashtag#nuclear motion. [1,2] In this talk, Flaviano will first show that reliable lattice energies can be obtained with quantum diffusion hashtag#MonteCarlo. [3,4] Then, he will demonstrate the generation of machine learning interatomic potentials capable of describing molecular crystals at finite temperature and pressure with sub-chemical accuracy, using as few as ∼ 200 data structures, an order of magnitude improvement over the current state-of-the-art. [5] The
models successfully reproduce experiments for a diverse range of molecular crystals and open up the prospects of reliable modeling for drug discovery and beyond.

[1] G. J. O. Beran, Chem. Rev. 2016, 116, 9, 5567–5613 (2016)
[2] V. Kapil and E. A. Engel, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 119 (6) e2111769119 (2022)
[3] F. Della Pia, A. Zen, D. Alfè, A. Michaelides, J. Chem. Phys. 157, 134701 (2022)
[4] F. Della Pia, A. Zen, D. Alfè, A. Michaelides, Phys. Rev. Lett. 133, 046401 (2024)
[5] F. Della Pia, B. X. Shi, V. Kapil, A. Zen, D. Alfè, A. Michaelides,Chem. Sci., 16, 11419-11433 (2025)

Previous winners – and their presentations at CIUK – can be viewed here.

We are currently accepting applications for the CIUK 2025 Poster Competition here.

The theme for this year’s conference is Computing Uniteswith sub-themes including The Power of Community, Sustainable, Energy-Efficient Computing, Engaging with Industry and Cyber Security. Topics of interest also include, but are not limited to, all forms of advances in high performance computing, storage, networking, big data analysis, quantum computing, and software development.

Selected posters will be displayed physically at the conference and also online, as well as being included in the official conference proceedings.  We plan to display selected posters online on the CIUK website and physically at the conference on 4-5 December, where a panel of judges will select their winning poster. The winner will be announced before the final session on the afternoon of Friday 5 December.

All selected posters should be displayed physically at the conference before 9:30am on Thursday 4 December. CIUK is not responsible for printing any selected posters – all posters must be printed by the applicant – but selected poster presenters will receive FREE entry to the conference.

Important deadlines:

• Friday 14th November – deadline of submission of abstracts
• w/c Monday 17st November – applications considered by CIUK Programme Committee
• w/c Monday 24th November – applicants informed of panel decision

Please note that the poster competition is open to undergraduate and graduate students plus early careers researchers (within 5 years of qualification).

The CIUK 2025​ Research Zone will allow all EPSRC Tier-2 Centres, and other sites with significant size computing facilities, the opportunity to join the CIUK exhibition and update attendees on their progress. Delegates can visit them in the exhibition hall to find out about their systems, discuss potential projects and discover how to get access.

CIUK 2025 Research Zone:

• DiRAC
• JASMIN
• IRIS
• MMM Hub
• Hartree Centre
• Scientific Computing
• Society of Research and Software Engineering
• CAKE DRI
• NI-HPC
• CSD3
• Bristol Centre for Supercomputing (BriCS) – Isambard
• HPC Midland
• JISC
• HPC-SIG
• Baskerville