Isilon Systems Installed by Medical College of Wisconsin

Isilon Systems, Inc. announced that the Human and Molecular Genetics Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW) has deployed Isilon scale-out storage to power its next-generation DNA sequencing operations.

Using Isilon’s X-Series, featuring the OneFS operating system, MCW has consolidated its genomic processing, analysis and archiving onto a single, shared storage resource, simplifying data management to reduce costs and improve workflow efficiency. With Isilon, MCW has been able to scale its storage resources to accommodate a 10-fold increase in genomic data, while also improving its genomic sequencing performance, accelerating time-to-discovery in the pursuit of personalized medicine.  

MCW is a national leader in the education and development of physicians and scientists, while its Human and Molecular Genetics Center leverages genomic sequencing to understand disease and translate this information into personalized medicine. Prior to using Isilon, MCW’s direct-attached storage (DAS) couldn’t scale to meet the performance and capacity demands of its next-generation sequencing workflow, limiting MCW’s ability to maximize the value of its genomic research data.

By deploying the Isilon 36000X, in combination with an Illumina Inc.‘s sequencer and Dell servers, MCW has unified its DNA sequencing operations to improve performance and maximize the return on investment. With Isilon, MCW can now scale storage resources in-line with continued data growth and increasing patient demand.  

"As the rate of innovation in next-generation sequencing continues to drive exponential data growth, storage plays a critical role in enabling researchers to extract maximum insight from genomic information," said Sam Grocott, vice president of marketing, Isilon. "By using Isilon to simplify the sequencing process, MCW is accelerating the rate at which it can transform genomic data into the next medical breakthrough."