HPC Happenings
Mathematica Webinar Presented by Rice University – October 22, 2012, 11:30am CT
The XSEDE Scholars Program is hosting a webinar that will be presented by Troy Schaudt, Wolfram Research Academic Key Account Manager who will give an overview of Mathematica (http://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/) and how it is used in research and industry. He will then run through a few demos of how Mathematica is used in both serial and parallel computations, and at the end, will conclude with highlights of some of the newest features of the computational software program. To register, please visit https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dDhvZUVlck5PMndibGRXbEtsNFNzU3c6MA#gid=0.
Introduction to Scientific Visualization on Gordon at SDSC
October 24, 2012 – virtual and onsite
Visualization is largely understood and utilized as an excellent communication tool by researchers. This narrow view often keeps scientists from using and developing visualization skillets. This tutorial will provide a grounds-up understanding of visualization and its utility in error diagnostic and exploration of data for scientific insight. When used effectively, visualization can provide a complementary and effective toolset for data analysis, which is one of the most challenging problems in computational domains. In this tutorial, we plan to bridge these gaps by providing end users with fundamental visualization concepts, execution tools, and usage examples. For more information and to register, please visit https://www.xsede.org/web/xup/course-calendar.
XSEDE New User Training
October 26, 2012 – 2:00pm-3: 30pm CT
The XSEDE new user training is a 90-minute webinar providing general overview and reference information for first-time users of XSEDE resources at any of XSEDE's service providers. This session is particularly targeted at users who have just received their first allocation on XSEDE. It is not intended to teach programming, numerical methods, or computational science, but rather to provide a quick tour of what XSEDE has to offer. This webcast is free, and open to all users or prospective users of XSEDE resources. To register, please visit https://www.xsede.org/web/xup/course-calendar,
Now on the Web: XSEDE-related Presentations and Events at SC12
The XSEDE project and its staff members are well represented in the technical program and on the exhibit floor at SC12. The link below includes the schedule for all known speakers, presenters, events and booths related to XSEDE. Please submit any additional XSEDE-related information for this page to Susan McKenna, mckennas@ncsa.illinois.edu. To view the XSEDE-related presentations and events, please visit https://www.xsede.org/xsede-sc.
Mark Your Calendar: Supercomputing in Plain English (SiPE) –Starting January 2013
Tuesdays starting January 22 2013 - 2:00pm CT
Available live in person and live via videoconferencing
SiPE is targeted at an audience of not only computer scientists but especially scientists and engineers, including a mixture of undergraduates, graduate students, faculty and staff. These workshops focus on fundamental issues of HPC as they relate to Computational and Data-enabled Science and Engineering. The key philosophy of the SiPE workshops is that an HPC-based code should be maintainable, extensible and, most especially, portable across platforms, and should be sufficiently flexible that it can adapt to, and adopt, emerging HPC paradigms. As of today, the SiPE workshops have reached roughly 1000 people at 166 institutions, agencies, companies and organizations in 42 US states and territories and 5 other countries. Registration coming soon at http://www.oscer.ou.edu/education.php.
HPC Call for Participation for Upcoming Workshops
Call for Video Submissions for SC12 Video Loop
Submission Deadline – October 19, 2012
The keynote and plenary sessions at SC12 will feature an SC-sponsored "Walk-in Video Loop" that will run as attendees arrive and depart. This is a unique, highly visible platform to showcase XSEDE projects that can be shared via video or images, and participation is free. Files should be in a standard Quicktime or Windows codec format, and should include a separate file with the XSEDE logo, along with the names and photos of people involved in the project (if available). Please send info on potential XSEDE video submissions and/or any video submissions that your institutions plan to submit to Susan McKenna, mckennas@ncsa.illinois.edu. If you have any questions please email: walkinvideo@info.supercomputing.org.
3rd IHPCES Call for Papers
June 5-7, 2013 - Barcelona, Spain
Submission Deadline – January 15, 2013
The 3rd International Workshop on Advances in High-Performance Computational Earth Sciences: Applications and Frameworks (IHPCES) has opened the call for papers, with a deadline of Jan. 15, 2013. IHPCES is co-chaired by Yifeng Cui, research scientist at SDSC and member of XSEDE ECSS. The workshop facilitates communication between earth scientists, applied mathematicians, and computational and computer scientists. It also presents a unique opportunity for participants to exchange advanced knowledge, insights and science discoveries. Co-chair Cui encourages XSEDE researchers and users to participate by submitting a paper reflecting current research in the area of computational science. IHPCES 2013 is held in conjunction with the 13th International Conference on Computational Science (ICCS2013. For more information, please visit http://hpgeoc.sdsc.edu/IHPCES2013/index.html.
Upcoming Conferences and Workshops
EDUCAUSE
November 6-9, 2012 - Denver, Colorado
The EDUCAUSE Annual Conference is the premiere gathering for higher education IT professionals. It provides content and exploration of today's toughest technology issues facing campuses around the world, and convenes some of the brightest minds in the community. When colleagues from around the world converge with some of the most innovative corporate solution providers, you have an event that creates invaluable networking opportunities and professional development. For more information, please visit http://www.educause.edu/annual-conference.
SC12
November 10-16, 2012 - Salt Lake City, Utah
Exhibition - November 12-15, 2012
For 24 years, SC has been at the forefront in gathering the best and brightest minds in supercomputing together, with our unparalleled technical papers, tutorials, posters and speakers. SC12 will take a major step forward not only in supercomputing, but in super-conferencing, with everything designed to make the 2012 conference the most ‘you' friendly conference in the world. We're streamlining conference information and moving to a virtually real-time method of determining technical program thrusts. No more pre-determined technical themes picked far in advance. Through social media, data mining, and active polling, we'll see which technical interests and issues emerge throughout the year, and focus on the ones that interest you the most. For more information and to register, please visit http://sc12.supercomputing.org/content/exhibitor-prospectus.
2013 Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing Conference – Call for Participation
February 7-9, 2013 – Washington, DC
Application Deadline – November 25, 2012
• Panel Proposals Submissions- www.tapiaconference.org/2013/participate.html
• BoF Proposal Submissions - www.tapiaconference.org/2013/participate.html
• Workshop Proposal Submissions - www.tapiaconference.org/2013/participate.html
• Doctoral Consortium Submissions – www.tapiaconference.org/2013/dc.html
• Poster Proposal Submissions - www.tapiaconference.org/2013/participate.html
• Scholarship Applications – Available October 15, 2012
The 2013 Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing Conference has issued a call for participation, inviting submissions for panel discussions, student research posters, birds-of-a-feather sessions and workshops. Additionally, applications are now being accepted for the Doctoral Consortium and student scholarships to attend the conference. Confirmed speakers include Vint Cerf (Google VP and ACM President), Armando Fox (UC Berkeley), Anita Jones (University of Virginia), Jeanine Cook (New Mexico State University), Annie Anton (Georgia Tech), and Hakim Weatherspoon, (Cornell University), among others. For more information, please visit the http://tapiaconference.org/2013/.
XSEDE Training at a Glance. . .
Introduction to Scientific Visualization on Gordon at SDSC
October 24, 2012 - 1:00pm-4:30 PDT, La Jolla, California and webcast
For more information, please visit https://www.xsede.org/web/xup/course-calendar/-/training/class/68.
XSEDE New User Training
October 26, 2012 – 2:00pm-3:30pm CT
For more information, please visit https://www.xsede.org/web/xup/course-calendar.
For a complete list of past and future XSEDE training opportunities, please visit https://www.xsede.org/web/xup/course-calendar.
Research Features from Across XSEDE and Campus Champion Partners
Recreating a Slice of the Universe at Harvard University
Researchers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) and the Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies (HITS) have developed Arepo, software that can accurately follow the birth and evolution of thousands of galaxies over billions of years. "We've created the full variety of galaxies we see in the local universe," says CfA's Mark Vogelsberger. Arepo generates a full simulation of the universe, taking as input only the observed afterglow of the Big Bang and evolving forward in time for 14 billion years. "We took all the advantages of previous codes and removed the disadvantages," says HITS researcher Volker Springel. Arepo utilizes a grid that flexes and moves in space to match the motions of the underlying gas, stars, dark matter, and dark energy. The simulations ran on Harvard's Odyssey high-performance supercomputer, using 1,024 processor cores, which enabled the program to compress 14 billion years of universal evolution into a few months. To read further, please visit http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/news/2012/pr201223.html.
UIUC Researchers Study the Effects of Supercomputing on Wall Street
A University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign research team has been creating media buzz recently for its research using XSEDE-allocated resources to explore the impact of high frequency trading. Since the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission authorized electronic trades in 1998, trading firms have developed the speed and sophistication of high frequency trading (HFT), and HFT has since been dominating the market. Mao Ye, assistant professor of finance at the University of Illinois, and the team he led note that the amount of data produced by HFT has exploded to such an extent that it challenges data processing’s ability to study it. To directly address the data problem and other questions related to HFT, Ye and colleagues, Maureen O’Hara of Cornell University and Chen Yao and Jiading Gai, also of Illinois, turned to XSEDE, specifically the shared-memory resources of Blacklight at the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center and Gordon at the San Diego Supercomputer Center. To read further, please visit http://www.hpcwire.com/hpcwire/2012-10-04/researchers_study_the_effects_of_supercomputing_on_wall_street.html.
SDSC to House Data Repository for NIH Metabolomics Project
The San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) at the University of California, San Diego, will house the data repository for a new project funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) aimed at accelerating the study of metabolomics, an emerging field of biomedical research that studies chemical processes that could help more clearly define the mechanisms underlying diseases, such as diabetes and obesity, and develop new strategies for treatment. SDSC joins other UC San Diego research units and organizations, which were awarded $6 million over five years out of a larger NIH metabolome program investment. To read further, please visit http://www.sdsc.edu/News%20Items/PR101112_metabolomics.html.
Rutgers University Device Could Transmit a User-Specific ID Through the Skin
Rutgers University researchers have developed a device that could enable rapid switching between settings for people who share the same device, allow a game to distinguish between multiple players using the same screen, replace passwords, or provide another layer of protection in addition to passwords. The technology involves a battery-powered ring with flash memory that holds a code, and a signal generator that transmits the code as tiny voltage spikes. Touch screens then pick up those spikes, and software on the phone reads them as password-like data. "Imagine every electronic gadget knowing who you are and adapting to your preferences, or even offering you personalized information" because it knows your touch, says Duke University's Romit Roy Choudhury, who notes the technology "opens new directions in user interaction and authentication." To read further, please visit http://www.technologyreview.com/news/429037/replacing-your-password-with-a-finger-swipe/.
Visual Programming Means Anyone Can Be a Coder
New York University programmer Toby Schachman has developed Recursive Drawing, an experimental programming interface that enables coders to incrementally build complex, fractal-like structures. The interface allows users to manipulate the underlying source code by dragging parts of the patterns around. Schachman says the ideas behind the interface could change the way programming is performed in the future. He says there would be no need to be concerned about changing the underlying code, because "the form that you're working in resembles the thing that you're creating." Although there is still a major gap between writing the text and seeing what the running program does, "bringing in graphical ideas like Schachman does can definitely reduce this gap," says Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium researcher Peter van Roy. Recursive Drawing is part of a trend that will help democratize programming, predicts City University in London researcher Sara Jones. To read further, please visit http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21528796.800-visual-programming-means-anyone-can-be-a-coder.html.
Berkeley Lab Researchers Make Historic Observation of Rare Type 1a Supernova
Exploding stars called Type 1a supernova are ideal for measuring cosmic distance because they are bright enough to spot across the Universe and have relatively the same luminosity everywhere. Although astronomers have many theories about the kinds of star systems involved in these explosions (or progenitor systems), no one has ever directly observed one - until now. In the August 24 issue of Science, the multi-institutional Palomar Transient Factory (PTF) team presents the first-ever direct observations of a Type 1a supernova progenitor system. Astronomers have collected evidence indicating that the progenitor system of a Type 1a supernova, called PTF 11kx, contains a red giant star. They also show that the system previously underwent at least one much smaller nova eruption before it ended its life in a destructive supernova. The system is located 600 million light years away in the constellation Lynx. By comparison, indirect observations of another Type 1a supernova progenitor system (called SN 2011fe, conducted by the PTF team last year) showed no evidence of a red giant star. Taken together, these observations unequivocally show that just because Type 1a supernovae look the same, that doesn't mean they are all born the same way. To read further, please visit http://hpwren.ucsd.edu/news/20120823/.
Educator News and Curriculum
2013-14 Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellowship
The Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellowship Program is now accepting applications for the 2013-2014 Fellowship Year. The Einstein Fellowship Program is available to current K-12 science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) educators with a demonstrated excellence in teaching and leadership. Selected teachers spend 11 months in Washington, D.C., sharing their expertise with STEM program directors or policy makers. Einstein Fellows may serve in a Congressional office or in one of several government agencies such as the Department of Energy (DOE), the National Science Foundation (NSF), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), or the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Fellows receive a monthly stipend and an allowance for professional travel and relocation. The fellowship year begins in late August 2013. For more information, submission guidelines and to apply, please visit http://www.trianglecoalition.org/einstein-fellows.
Researchers Hope to Transform Software Engineering Training
San Francisco State University researchers hope to improve the effectiveness of software engineering teams by learning what causes them to fail. "Failures in communication, organization, and teamwork are the primary cause of problems in software engineering," says SF State professor Dragutin Petkovic. He says the high rate of failure points to a need to rethink how software engineers are trained and managed, to ensure they develop the teamwork skills necessary to thrive in the working world. Petkovic is leading a study to determine what affects whether software engineering teams succeed and use that information to develop new software models that can objectively predict whether a team is likely to fail. He says the project will be the first to objectively and quantitatively measure the future success of a team. "You could then use this 'early prediction' to adjust your teaching and help potentially failing teams," Petkovic says. As part of the study, researchers will collect data, such as how often team members email each other or meet, how much time they spend coding, and how long it takes for problems to get resolved. To read further, please visit http://news.sfsu.edu/researchers-hope-transform-software-engineering-training.
Free Online Course Will Rely on Multiple Sites
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology's OpenCourseWare program is launching "A Gentle Introduction to Python," a new course that will operate as a mechanical massive open online course (MOOC) and teach the computer programming language by patching together existing resources from other open-learning sites. In addition to OpenCourseWare material, the class will use instant-feedback exercises and quizzes from Codecademy, OpenStudy, and Peer 2 Peer University. "The MOOCs that have come out in the last six months are really incredible and have truly moved the needle for online learning, but they are based on very sophisticated central platforms and require significant resources to develop," says Peer 2 Peer University co-founder Philipp Schmidt. The mechanical MOOC will not be as tightly structured as the free courses currently offered by universities such as Harvard, Berkeley, Stanford, and the University of Pennsylvania. To read further, please visit http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/21/education/mechanical-mooc-to-rely-on-free-learning-sites.html.
Student Engagement Opportunities and Information
The Richard Tapia Conference Offers Scholarships
Application Deadline – November 25, 2012
Scholarships will be available again this year to attend the 2013 Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing Conference, February 7-10 in Washington, D.C. The financial assistance helps ensure the attendance of those who would otherwise be unable to participate and encourages diversity in conference attendance. The application form is expected to be posted online within the next few days, and the deadline for submission is Nov. 25. Scholarships are generally awarded to students and mentors who also will be presenting at the conference and cover travel, hotel accommodations, meals, and conference registration. For more information and to apply, please visit http://tapiaconference.org/2013/scholarships.html.
Indiana University InCNTRE Summer of Network Internship Program
May 20 - July 16, 2013 – Bloomington, Indiana
Application Deadline – November 30, 2012
There are two essential elements to starting a successful career in data networking: real-world experience and hands-on training. InCNTRE's Summer of Networking internship program at IU Bloomington provides both in abundance. Each day of the Summer of Networking includes participation in a real-world project (during the morning) and classroom instruction (during the afternoon) from IU's acclaimed network engineering and research staff. In addition to participation in projects and classroom instruction, students will collaboratively build and operate their own dorm room network. For more information, including project areas, eligibility and stipend awards, please visit http://incntre.iu.edu/summer. Questions can be addressed to summer@incntre.iu.edu
Career Opportunities
Position for a PhD with interests in modeling complex biological systems Rockefeller University, NYC
Focus will be on developing theoretical models and simulation code to study dynamics of biological macromolecules and complexes. Efforts will build on previous work in modeling transport in the nuclear pore complex (Mincer and Simon, PNAS 2011), with the goal of developing general approaches to modeling and computing the dynamics of complex biological machines. Application of such approaches will be to specific problems of interest in the laboratory, i.e. viral assembly and operation of the proteasome. Rockefeller University is looking for a candidate with modeling experience and proficiency in various programming languages. Expertise in mathematical analysis of complex systems, as well as experience with GPU programming, would be beneficial. Work will include active collaboration with experimentalists in the laboratory: experiment in the lab is guiding theoretical developments and vice versa. The candidate will also interface with mathematicians and computer scientists who are actively optimizing the existing modeling software we have developed. The project is based in the Laboratory of Cellular Biophysics at Rockefeller University (Prof. Sanford Simon) in collaboration with the Department of Anesthesiology at Mount Sinai Medical Center. Interested applicants are invited to submit a cover letter and CV to Dr. Joshua Mincer (jmincer@gmail.com).
Last But Not Least – Computational News of Interest
SDSC’s Gordon Supercomputer Used in 61-Million-Person Facebook Experiment
A recently published study led by the University of California, San Diego in collaboration with Facebook and done in part using large-scale simulations on the San Diego Supercomputer Center’s (SDSC) data-intensive Gordon supercomputer, confirms that peer pressure helps get out the vote while demonstrating that online social networks can affect important real-world behavior. The study, published this month in the science journal Nature, found that about one-third of a million more people showed up at the ballot box in the United States on November 2, 2010 because of a single Facebook message posted on that Election Day. To read further, please visit http://www.sdsc.edu/News%20Items/PR092012_fb_vote.html.
University of Texas at Austin Fighting Back Against Click-Spam
University of Texas at Austin researchers recently presented their paper, "Measuring and Fingerprinting Click-Spam in Ad Networks," at the SIGCOMM 2012 conference. The paper aimed to quantify the traffic on an ad network. "To our surprise, we found this was extremely challenging, and, aside from a scattered few anecdotes, there was no well-known, systematic technique, so we decided to come up with one," says University of Texas at Austin's Saikat Guha. The researchers developed a technique that provides the first independent methodology for advertisers to measure the click-spam problem, and supports an automated method for ad networks to identify simultaneous click-spam attacks proactively. "For a reputed ad network, only one out of 20 people clicking our ad stayed for longer than five seconds," Guha says. "We suspect this is because people misclicked the ad due to the small mobile-screen sizes and quickly hit the back button." To read further, please visit http://phys.org/news/2012-08-click-spam.html.
Augmented Reality Kitchens Keep Novice Chefs on Track
Kyoto Sangyo University researchers have developed a kitchen with ceiling-mounted cameras and projectors that overlay cooking instructions on the ingredients. "Cooks can easily and visually understand how to prepare an ingredient for a recipe even if they have no cooking experience," says Kyoto Sangyo's Yu Suzuki. The kitchen also is equipped with a small robot assistant, called Phyno, that sits on the countertop. When the cameras detect the chef has stopped touching the ingredients, Phyno asks if that step of the recipe is complete. University of Washington researchers also have installed cameras in a kitchen to watch over novice chefs. The Washington researchers used Kinect-like depth-sensing cameras to record both the shape and appearance of kitchen objects. The system uses both object- and action-recognition technology to determine what the cook is doing. To read further, please visit http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21528774.900-augmented-reality-kitchens-keep-novice-chefs-on-track.html.
