Meet the team

David Smyth, Director NI-HPC

David is Director of the Northern Ireland High-Performance Computing (NI-HPC) Centre, based in Queen's University Belfast, where his focus is on developing the digital research service provision for researchers at a local and national level.

Professor Roger Woods, School of Electric and Electronical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Roger Woods is a professor of computer hardware who is the principal investigator for project that funds NI-HPC. He is specifically engaged with strategic funding and leading on funding bids. His expertise is on specialised hardware for data analytics and artificial intelligence. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers and a member of the Royal Irish Academy. He likes to get out walking in the beautiful Northern Ireland countryside.

Professor Iain Styles, School of Electric and Electronical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Professor Iain Styles is academic co-lead of NI-HPC. His research interests are in AI for Science and Engineering with particular interest in novel computer vision techniques for scientific imaging. Before joining QUB in 2023, Iain was PI and Director of the Baskerville Tier 2 facility in Birmingham and he is a current member of the EPSRC Research Infrastructure Strategic Advisory Team. Outside of work, he enjoys a variety of sports and working on his house and garden.

Professor Jim Harkin, School of Computing, Engineering and Intelligent Systems at Ulster University 

Jim Harkin is Professor of Computer Engineering with the School of Computing, Engineering and Intelligent Systems at Ulster University (Derry~Londonderry campus). Jim is the academic lead for the NI-HPC at Ulster University, contributing to HPC strategic planning and the promotion and growth of the HPC user base at Ulster. His personal research investigates the design of highly efficient, secure and reliable embedded systems that emulate the computational and fault tolerance capabilities found in biology. In particular, he focuses his efforts on the development of the brain-inspired EMBRACE architecture which aims to address electronic reliability challenges via emerging NeuroAI-compute architectures. His early research career was centred on the acceleration of bio-inspired Machine Learning algorithms using FPGA hardware. In his spare time, Jim can still be found turning the guitar volume on his amplifier to 11 and jamming with his peers.

Dr Vaughan Purnell, Research Computing Manager 

Vaughan Purnell is the Head of Research Computing and Data Services within the NI-HPC group at Queen’s University Belfast (QUB). His role focuses on providing advanced technical research services to the university’s research community, with a particular emphasis on developing new capabilities for artificial intelligence (AI) and secure data environments.
VP has worked in high-performance computing (HPC) since 2006, leading the procurement, delivery, and operation of several major systems including the Dell XC, SGI Altix, Kelvin (HPE), and Kelvin2 (Dell). His work is largely strategic, supporting QUB’s evolving research priorities and ensuring that our computational infrastructure continues to meet the demands of cutting-edge research.
VP graduated from QUB in 1994 with a degree in Computer Science and completed my PhD in 1999, entitled "Applying AI Techniques to Automatic Parallelization." In 2021, He was honoured with the Vice-Chancellor’s Research Prize for research, engagement, and impact across Queen’s.
His research interests span the diverse areas supported by NI-HPC, with particular enthusiasm for projects in sustainability, healthcare, and astrophysics.
Outside of work, VP is an active person and previously competed in mountain fell races and triathlons, representing Ireland at international level. Following a heart attack, He has scaled back the intensity but continue to enjoy exercising socially for health and well-being. He is also passionate about music and enjoys playing guitar at home, often accompanied by his niece on vocals.

James McGroarty, Research Software Engineer Team Leader 

James McGroarty is the team lead for the RSE group at NI-HPC. He is responsible for the development and maintenance of Kelvin2 and McClay/RDS research data storage while supporting end users to enable a high-quality service.
James has worked in HPC since 2016 joining the team directly after completing his computer science degree at QUB.
James started as a graduate Engineer working on the original Kelvin System and has overseen multiple projects and roles during the transition and ongoing lifecycle of Kelvin2.
His work interests span across all things HPC and AI.
Outside of work James is an avid footballer playing both 5 aside and 11 aside multiple times a week (often to a poor standard).
When he gets the time, he still likes to spend some time gaming and reading science fiction.

Dr Luis Fernández Menchero, Research Software Engineer.

Luis Fernández Menchero is part of the RSE Team in Kelvin-2. He gives support to the research groups with the installation and update of the scientific applications. He also helps the groups to optimize those applications for the hardware of the HPC and get the maximum performance.
LFM is also certified as instructor and University Ambassador for the Nvidia Deep Learning Institute. He imparts regular courses of GPU-focused programming in CUDA-C++.
LFM got a PhD in Physics, and he has been researcher in several projects, where he was regular user of HPC systems. In 2020, he swap from the user side to the administrator side of the HPC World.
Outside of work, during the short free time that his life of single parent allows, Luis enjoys visiting the gym regularly, and playing chess. He is also enthusiast of fantasy books.

Dr Steven Cousens, Research Software Engineer

Steven Cousens is a Research Software Engineer at NI‑HPC, where he provides user support for the Kelvin2 supercomputer and system administration of the McClayRDS storage platform. Prior to joining NI‑HPC, he completed a PhD in computational plasma physics and went on to several years of postdoctoral research before working as a data analyst in the health service.
His recent work has focused on developing analytics tools to improve system monitoring and reporting, including queue analysis, system utilisation dashboards, and monthly energy reports for users. One day each week, Steven is embedded in the School of Mathematics and Physics, where he collaborates with a research group to modernise a scientific code by introducing more efficient linear algebra routines and preparing it for GPU acceleration.
Outside of work, Steven enjoys spending time with his two young children, playing the piano, and exploring the night sky through amateur astronomy.

Krister Jazz Urog, Research Software Engineer

Jazz Urog is a Research Software Engineer for the NI-HPC team. He helps maintain the kelvin2 cluster and support users wanting to utilise it. As a certified carpentries instructor, and an NVIDIA DLI ambassador he also teaches some of the training courses offered by the team specifically the CUDA Python course certified by NVIDIA. His research interests include complex systems, bioinformatics, and anything related with software development and optimisation.
He got his MS Physics degree from the University of the Philippines (2019), and finished his Master in High Performance computing from SISSA (Trieste, Italy) in 2021 sponsored by the International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP). Since then he has been working with cloud computing and HPC.
Outside work and family duties, he likes to play sports, online games, and collects cards from One Piece TCG.

Dr Brian Cunningham, Research Software Engineer

Brian Cunningham is a Research Software Engineer at NI-HPC, where he helps maintain the Kelvin2 cluster and support research groups with their software requirements and troubleshooting. His work focuses on ensuring HPC systems run reliably and efficiently while enabling researchers to get the most out of our infrastructure.
Before joining NI-HPC, Brian worked as a physicist, and he is still actively involved in the scientific community, publishing and collaborating with Prof Dermot Green’s antimatter research group at Queen’s University Belfast. He brings this research experience into his HPC work, combining scientific computing expertise with a deep interest in high-performance computing.
Outside of work, he is passionate about music, playing the guitar and singing in a local band, and also enjoys weightlifting. He likes keeping up with new developments in science and technology and exploring ways to integrate them into his work.

Zara Birch, Engagement Officer 

Zara Birch is our Engagement Officer, bringing over 25 years of communications and engagement experience across diverse industries, including FMCG, biopharma, education, and government.
Passionate about connecting people and sharing stories that make an impact, she thrives on building relationships and fostering collaboration. Zara recognises the importance of storytelling in any industry. While not from a technical background, she’s inspired daily by how technology drives innovation and advances research, ultimately transforming our world. She enjoys translating complex information into meaningful, human stories.
After 20 years in Australia, Zara has recently returned to Belfast with her family and is delighted to be home. Outside of work, she enjoys spending time with friends and family, swimming, gigs, and getting out in nature (just with a big coat and a warm hat!) 

Dr José Sánchez Bornot, Research Software Engineer

Dr José Sánchez Bornot is a NI-HPC Research Software Engineer, supporting users on cluster utilization, parallel programming, and software installation (mainly MATLAB, Python, R, Ansys/fluent, Conda, etc.).
José has a BSc in Computer Science and a PhD in Applied Mathematics. He has also completed two postdoctoral positions in Magnetoencephalography analysis and Computational neuroimaging at the University of Ulster. He has more than 40 high-impact factor peer-reviewed publications and is currently teaching parallel programming courses using MATLAB and Python on the NI-HPC cluster.

Cyn Thia Neo, Placement Student

As a placement student in the HPC team, Cyn Thia Neo is currently developing her skills in high-performance computing through hands-on learning and training. Her duties include shadowing experienced colleagues, assisting with day-to-day tasks, and learning essential tools such as Linux command-line operations and system management. Although this is her first experience in the HPC field, she is enthusiastic about gaining practical knowledge and contributing to the team’s work. She is particularly interested in how HPC supports research and innovation across different disciplines. Outside of work, She enjoys listening to music, reading novels, and spending time relaxing — She likes to keep things calm and balanced.