National Center for Computational Sciences

Laboratory front and center at premier supercomputing conference

Once again ORNL enjoyed tremendous success at SC07 (short for Supercomputing 2007), the premier international symposium for HPC, networking, storage, and analysis.

ORNL’s Becky Verastegui was the general chair of the conference, and several ORNL researchers served in key committee positions. ORNL’s Gregory Pike was a cowinner of the Bandwidth Challenge for Using the Data Capacitor for Remote Data Collection, Analysis, and Visualization.

The laboratory’s booth featured all-electronic content displaying the latest breakthroughs in alternative energy solutions, astrophysics, climate modeling, and fusion energy and previewed the future of supercomputing: petascale science.

The booth, which featured several keynote speakers, enjoyed strong attendance and introduced the National Institute for Computational Sciences, a collaboration between the University of Tennessee and ORNL in response to the university’s recent $65 million award from the National Science Foundation.

“The SC conference continues to be the showcase for high-performance computing,” said Jack Dongarra, a professor in the Innovative Computing Laboratory at the University of Tennessee. “The conference continues to grow and provide a ‘homecoming’ for the HPC community. From an excellent technical program to tutorials to workshops to panels along with exhibits, it provides the premier conference for high-performance computing, networking, storage, and analysis.”

Two members of ORNL’s NCCS User Assistance and Outreach Group, Don Frederick and Bobby Whitten, hosted a “birds-of-a-feather” entitled “HPC Centers and Services.” Birds-of-a-feather are semi-informal get-togethers to discuss common issues, said Frederick. Four major supercomputing centers made presentations at the session: the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center, the NCCS, and National Center for Atmospheric Research. According to Frederick, about 35 attendees were present, and the group concluded the meeting by
agreeing to continue discussions and collaborations electronically through a mailing list or bulletin board to ensure continued communication on important issues.