Have you considered using AWS EC2 Spot Instances? The price can be 50 to 70% cheaper. You would have to add some additional reliability to your pipeline so it

Have you considered using AWS EC2 Spot Instances? The price can be 50 to 70% cheaper. You would have to add some additional reliability to your pipeline so it could continue processing when instances are unexpectedly terminated. But this might be well worth it as it sounds like your research group is cost-constrained. AWS made some changes this year so the spot prices are more stable and instances don't get shut down as frequently.