NEC shipped 50 SX-5 systems to date - new computer at University of Montreal

 Montreal 08 May 00 The Centre for Research on Computation and its Applications (CERCA) today announced that they began production use of a new NEC SX-5S/2 parallel vector supercomputer. The University of Montreal acquired the system in support of RQCHP, a research consortium comprised of the University of Montreal, CERCA and the University of Sherbrooke. Research at CERCA is focused on aspects of fluid dynamics (aerodynamics, hydraulics, turbulence, environment and combustion) and chemistry (pharmaceutical chemistry and materials). The computational resources are further augmented by a substantial visualization and networking infrastructure. Since first shipment in January 1999, 50 SX-5 systems have already been installed worldwide.

Dr.Charles Lin, Director of Atmospheric and Ocean Sciences at McGill University as well as a Member of CERCA, added: "In the short term we will use our SX-5 for high resolution regional atmospheric models. These will allow us to 'zoom in' on a given region using a spatial resolution that is higher than that of current operational weather prediction models. This is important because local peculiarities, such as topographic features, can be better resolved. We will also be doing 'ensemble' simulations where we run the model with slightly different initial conditions or parameters. The mean result of the ensemble simulations should provide a more accurate prediction than relying solely on a single simulation."

CERCA is a collaborative institution founded by Ecole Polytechnique, Concordia University, University of Montreal and McGill University. The objective of CERCA is to facilitate technology transfer from universities to industry. CERCA accomplishes this by bringing together the leading scientists in Quebec who specialize in advanced numerical methods for scientific applications, by maintaining a highly competitive scientific environment for the application of these methods, and by educating highly qualified personnel in advanced computational sciences. For further information on CERCA, please visit www.CERCA.UMontreal.ca .

 

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