Imperial College London Deploys First Liquid-Cooled HPC Cluster in Digital Realty's UK Data Center
February 3, 2026
In a significant move to bolster its research capabilities, Imperial College London has deployed its first direct liquid-cooled high-performance computing (HPC) cluster. The system is housed within Digital Realty's LGW14 data center campus in Woking, Surrey, marking a strategic shift for the university towards specialized, high-density infrastructure to support advanced artificial intelligence and scientific computing. The deployment is a core component of the Imperial College Intel Corporation Lenovo (ICICLE) initiative, which outlines the institution's roadmap for expanding its HPC and AI capacity. A contract for the cluster was signed in July 2025, with Digital Realty overseeing the entire integration process. This included structural reinforcements to the data center floor, the installation of Lenovo's direct liquid-cooling technology, and full system commissioning, leading to a handover of the fully operational environment in the fourth quarter of 2025. While specific compute capacity details were not disclosed, the cluster is designed to enable Imperial researchers to train larger AI models, accelerate data-intensive simulations, and shorten development cycles across critical fields such as drug discovery, climate modeling, robotics, and advanced materials science. The hosting facility, Digital Realty's largest London campus, spans 200,000 square feet across three stories and is engineered to support AI workloads with rack densities exceeding 100kW. “This deployment demonstrates what can be achieved when leading academic institutions, a global technology powerhouse, and digital infrastructure providers work closely together," said Séamus Dunne, managing director for UK & Ireland at Digital Realty. He emphasized that Imperial's ambitions require an environment built for "extreme performance, resilience, and sustainability." Jenny Rae, Chief Information Officer at Imperial College London, highlighted the growing centrality of digital infrastructure to modern research. “Advanced digital infrastructure is now as critical to research as laboratories and instrumentation," Rae stated. “Working with Digital Realty provides us with a secure, resilient, and sustainable platform, while Lenovo’s direct liquid-cooled technology allows us to grow our AI capabilities responsibly." The move underscores a broader trend where academic and research institutions are increasingly partnering with colocation providers to access the power, cooling, and scalability required for next-generation computing, moving beyond traditional on-premises or cloud-only models.
Source: datacenterdynamics
