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December 2023

Dear SDSC Staff, Collaborators, Partners and All Friends:

I hope you enjoyed a happy and healthy Thanksgiving. Now we’re at the threshold of the December holiday break, and many from SDSC are still basking in the glow of our successful participation at the international Supercomputing Conference, SC23, in Denver last month.

SC is an annual networking event that brings together thousands of leaders and experts—from scientists and engineers, researchers and educators, to programmers and developers—in high performance computing, networking, storage and analysis, thus linking all of these technologies at a unique trade show. The nearly week-long event features numerous sessions, speakers and engagement opportunities. What makes SC23 different from anything else I ever attend is the dual role it plays for both industry and academia. I personally have not experienced anything quite like it, and I look forward to it each year.

SDSC Launches New Industry-Focused R&D Consortium

New NSF Award Funds HPC Training for Domain Scientists

Expanse Used to Advance Fuel Cell Tech

FABRIC Project Reaches Groundbreaking High Speeds

The largest contingent of SDSC community members in recent memory—more than 50—attended the recent international 2023 Supercomputing Conference in Denver. With the COVID-19 pandemic largely a thing of the past, participants reported that it was gratifying to see and connect with colleagues from across the nation in-person again. We offer a brief sampling of SDSC conference experiences through the lens of just a few of the many programs hosted in the SDSC exhibit booth under the themes of Innovation, Insight and Impact: 

Innovation

AI and Fusion Panel
Frank Wuerthwein, SDSC, with NVIDIA and General Atomics panelists

GO FAIR U.S.: FAIR Workflows for HPC
Christine Kirkpatrick, SDSC

One Science Place
Amit Chourasia, SDSC

Insight

Prototype National Research Platform (PNRP)
Frank Wuerthwein and Ilkay Altintas, SDSC, with government, I2, and a small school on the panel

Science Enabled by Expanse/PATH
Bob Sinkovits, SDSC

SDSC Voyager: A Platform for Enabling AI in S&E
Amit Majumdar, SDSC, with panelists from Supermicro and Habana

Impact

WIFIRE: AI for All Hazards Response and Mitigation
Ilkay Altintas, SDSC

WIFIRE: Fighting Fires with Data
Rawaf al Rawaf, SDSC

Supercomputing: A Boost for Western U.S. Water Sustainability
Pat Mulrooney, UC San Diego

SDSC experts also presented as guest speakers in other exhibit booths, as well as participated in various Birds of a Feather (BoF) sessions. Two examples include BoF: Towards a National Artificial Intelligence (AI) Research Resource for Strengthening and Democratizing AI R&D, Ilkay Altintas and BoF: A National Science Data Fabric to Democratize Data Access and Reusability, Christine Kirkpatrick.  Last but not least, a group of UC San Diego computer science and engineering students mentored by SDSC’s Mary Thomas and others competed in the Student Cluster Competition. The team named Triton LLC (Last Level Cache) placed third overall out of a field of 11 in-person teams from around the world

Please enjoy a selection of photos and videos from the conference, courtesy of SDSC’s Jake Drake. 

Update from Sustainable Scientific Software Division (S3D)
This has been a unique and productive year for our division with many projects reaching major milestones. We recently launched OneSciencePlace®, our new content-centric online platform. It enables delivery of FAIR content and computing an easy-to-use environment. It will power the Quakeworx project at Statewide California Earthquake Center to provide state-of-the-art seismic tools for research and education on earthquake rupture forecasts. We also helped launch Chipshub at Purdue University, a new gateway that will shape the future of chip design and manufacturing in the US to support the goals of the CHIPS and Science Act. We continue to create turnkey solutions for large research communities in different domains. This year we completed the Pulsar Science Collaboratory for West Virginia University and the Green Bank Observatory that enables search for pulsars via citizen participation. Lastly and importantly, we also launched a new effort named SDx that provides professional software development services to the research community. The Pelican project at the OpenScienceGrid Consortium signed up for this service to add support for S3 storage in their data cache system. 

We welcomed Sandra Gesing to our division as a Senior Research Scientist with a joint appointment as the inaugural Executive Director of the U.S. Research Software Engineer Association. She is an expert on cyberinfrastructure, research software, FAIR guidelines and community building. We continued strong contributions to the recently concluded Science Gateways 2023 conference with papers by Jeanette Sperhac on science gateway metrics and by Sandra Gesing on the SGX3 project and on good practices for successful science gateways. Claire Stirm and Sandra Gesing also served as Logistics & Communications and Code of Conduct Co-Chairs respectively. Hubzero continued its support of the conference as a Platinum Sustaining Sponsor.

We are excited about the potential of initiating new projects with you in the upcoming new year. Please contact us to discuss your projects.

Happy holidays, 
Amit Chourasia
Associate Director, Sustainable Scientific Software Division at SDSC

SDSC Receives Honors in 2023 HPCwire Readers’ and Editors’ Choice Awards 

SDSC was presented with two HPCwire Awards at the 2023 International Conference for High Performance Computing, Networking, Storage, and Analysis (SC23), in Denver, CO. The highly coveted HPC community recognition includes a Readers' Choice award and an Editors' Choice award. 

CAIDA Examines Severe Network Outages, Offers Prevention Measures

A team of researchers from the Center for Applied Internet Data Analysis (CAIDA) at SDSC reviewed catastrophic outages – both unintentional and intentional attacks – based on access network maps to analyze them and better understand how to prevent these situations in the future.

Hubzero Collaborates on Chipshub Project 

The initiation of Chipshub with Purdue University marks a milestone. This groundbreaking gateway is poised to shape the future of chip design and manufacturing in the U.S. The initiative aligns with the CHIPS and Science Act, reinforcing Hubzero’s commitment to transformative projects. Developer Ilya Shunko created the template and design.

Summer 2024 SGX3 Internship Experience

Applications due January 31, 2024
The SGX3's Workforce Development team will offer a summer program for students to work on live impactful gateways at TACC in Austin, TX. The program is aimed at graduate students in computer science or computer engineering (or related fields). SGX3 will provide funding for interns to join the TACC science gateway team for the summer. Each student will also receive mentorship from TACC researchers and opportunities to develop their leadership skills.  Apply early!

HPWREN Camera Captures Progress of Highland Fire in October

This time lapse, formed with images acquired by an HPWREN camera, shows the #HighlandFire in Riverside County on Oct. 30, 2023, as seen from Palomar Mountain's High Point. It extends into the morning of Oct. 31 until 7:28 a.m.

Introducing EUGENe: An Easy-to-Use Deep Learning Genomics Software

New technology developed by UC San Diego scientists aims to make deep learning more accessible to genomics researchers around the world.

The Future of AI is Now

According to a story originally published in the Fall 2023 issue of UC San Diego Magazine, “We are living through a technological revolution, and AI is quickly ushering us into tomorrow.”

For a full listing of news around campus, please visit UC San Diego Today.