Extreme Computing Research Center

ALGORITHMS AND APPLICATIONS FOR EMERGING ARCHITECTURES To out-compute is to out-compete, in terms of accuracy (resolution), fidelity, complexity, certainty, turnaround time, and providing guidance for experiments. The ECRC enables diverse campaigns in science and engineering across KAUST and internationally to migrate effectively (in terms of human facility) and efficiently (in terms of hardware utilization and power consumption) to continually expanding computing performance. “Diverse” refers both to domain subject matter, from seismic imaging to genome-wide association studies, and to technique, from simulation based on first- principles models to machine learning where first-principles models are not known or less predictive per unit expenditure. The ECRC fulfills this vision by being a source of software that is widely used for the implementation of efficient algorithms for analytics and simulation on emerging hardware. Common to these diverse investigations are the pressures from communication-austere computer architectures to exploit “data sparsity,” to exploit instruction-level concurrency, and to reduce synchronization. We also carry out some of our own leading-edge computational science and engineering. In terms of technology translation, we engage both with computer vendors (e.g., Cray, NVIDIA) and industrial users (e.g., Aramco, McLaren). We also train students and post-docs for the rapidly expanding workforce in simulation and big data analytics, internationally and in the Kingdom. In short, the ECRC envisions making KAUST a “Mecca” for high performance computing (HPC). The ECRC will become a destination for HPC researchers by becoming a source.