Dr Dave McKay

Architect
Pronouns
he/him

I joined EPCC in November 2020, initially working on Data Slipstream, a project to build data pipelines around Earth Observation satellite data and derived data products, using EIDF. I have since worked on a number of projects involving data pipelines, taught on the EPCC MSc programmes, and worked in both on-prem cloud and HPC paradigms. Most recently I have joined LSST:UK as the UK Data Release Production Scientist (involving global HPC-like compute infrastructure) and a member of the UK IDAC RSP team (involving research cloud SaaS), and contributing to the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile.

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I started life as a computational chemist, completing a PhD at Heriot-Watt University and post-docs at INSA Toulouse, Heriot-Watt the University of St Andrews, often using EPCC-managed HPC systems (ARCHER, Cirrus, ARCHER2) throughout that 13-year period, with a running theme of automation to drive of scientific insight. When studying disorder and solid-state NMR spectroscopy of inorganic solids at St Andrews, the simulations and the data they produced became particularly vast, leading me to become interested in data science and data engineering.

I am the Applications Group Rep. and External Communications Lead on the EPCC Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Committee.

In my spare time I enjoy spending time with my family, playing the guitar and making guitar picks as a loss-making side hustle.