Content about high-performance computing

From the flow of air past an airplane’s wing down to the movement of electrons around individual atoms, supercomputers can be used to simulate materials at diverse scales. Different scales provide different levels of information, but little is known about how these levels are connected. Peter Coveney of University College London has been spearheading a long-term program that seeks to relate the behavior of atoms and molecules to properties at the macroscale.

Researchers at Virginia Tech have modeled and mapped grape production across an area spanning 19 states along the eastern US. Supercomputers helped crunch the numbers and stomp the grapes in an effort to speed wine development in the region. What these scientists have learned could aid farmers across the world and protect crops as our climate changes.

Humanities gateways are the newest arrow in the Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment (XSEDE) quiver. With friendly interfaces, these gateways make it easy for humanities researchers to stay on target and create the scholarship of the 21st century. Digital humanities specialist Alan Craig speaks with iSGTW about XSEDE's latest offering.

At the recent ISC High Performance event in Frankfurt, Germany, the new TOP500 list of the world’s most powerful supercomputers was announced. Shaheen XC40, a Cray system in Saudi Arabia, is now ranked as the world’s seventh fastest supercomputer, and is the first supercomputer from the Middle East to crack the top 10.

When hunting neutrinos, a more powerful particle beam increases the chance of seeing neutrinos interact. Fermilab scientists recently set a new world record for high-energy neutrino experiments with a sustained 521-kilowatt beam, and will soon achieve beam power over 1 megawatt.

Supercomputer simulations help Hubble see farther into the universe and reveal a startling fact: It’s not as crowded as once thought. Don’t worry though, you’re still not alone.

Researchers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory are modeling huge ocean eddies to track their ability to move particles – including carbon dioxide – into the deep. This work will help prioritize a global response to climate change.

Digital humanists look into the past to tell us about our present. Armed with supercomputing and artificial intelligence, they read big data archives for patterns and meanings otherwise hidden to the human reader. Douglas Duhaime is combing these repositories to trace the reuse of ideas; what he’s discovering will help catch thieves and maybe rewrite history – again.

The volume of video content has exploded in recent years, and museums and libraries face the daunting task of evaluating the condition of their collections to make preservation and access decisions. To meet this challenge, data curators, video engineers, supercomputing experts, and neuroscientists are testing and implementing quality assessment algorithms in supercomputers to rapidly identify levels of video quality in large collections.

An international group of astronomers began the Panchromatic Hubble Andromeda Treasury (PHAT) in 2011 to map and study the millions of stars that comprise the Andromeda galaxy. The project has captured the most detailed panoramic images of the galaxy yet seen, revealing that star formation appears to be the same across the universe.

The iridescent shimmer found on the inside of seashells and the outside of pearls is caused by an extremely strong and resilient substance called nacre. Biomaterials such as nacre are highly organized at the nanoscale, so by studying this organization it may be possible to elucidate the source of their remarkable mechanical performance, which often outstrips synthetic analogues.