Itkin Media Machine

The Department of Communication conducts intensive computational research and hosts its own GPU workstation to support research and training endeavors. A GPU, or graphics processing unit, is specialized computer hardware designed to handle complex computational tasks and data-intensive operations much faster than a regular computer. It can perform many calculations simultaneously, making it ideal for running simulations, analyzing large datasets, processing multimedia data, enhancing content in virtual reality, and more.

The Itkin Media Machine is a Lambda Vector (from https://lambdalabs.com) and has a configuration featuring a 32-core AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 5975WX with 256GB RAM and 2TB disk space. It is equipped with dual NVIDIA RTX A6000 graphics cards, each offering 48GB of memory, 10,752 CUDA cores, and 336 Tensor cores. This system is available for general use by graduate students and faculty researchers within the Department of Communication. We use this resource when high-performance computing can significantly accelerate modeling and analysis.

The Itkin is currently being used by faculty and graduate students to conduct simulations of the communicating brain, to analyze semantic patterns in social media, to transcribe large-scale online news media across languages, and more. This resource was made possible by a generous gift from the Mark Allen Itkin Centennial Fund in Communication Honoring Andrea L. Rich.

Prof. Andrea Rich was one of the founding faculty members in the Department of Communication. Prof. Rich conducted research on intercultural communication and served as Executive Vice Chancellor of UCLA in over 30 years of service to the university. She also served as CEO of Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). Her contributions to the university extended across decades and were substantial. As summarized in this feature:

“As executive vice chancellor, she led the reorganization of what are now the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center and the David Geffen School of Medicine into an integrated medical enterprise. And she played a critical role in the development of the Professional Schools Restructuring Initiative, a move that cut campus costs while creating a new School of Public Policy and Social Research, later renamed the Luskin School of Public Affairs.”

These and other contributions to the Department of Communication and UCLA are still felt today across many familiar initiatives and programs.