Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe
What is PRACE?
The Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe (PRACE) research infrastructure provides a persistent world-class high-performance computing service for scientists and researchers from academia and industry in Europe. PRACE aims to cover the top level (Tier-0) of the European HPC ecosystem, by establishing a permanent infrastructure of Tier-0 compute systems.
The mission of PRACE is further to enable high-impact scientific discovery and engineering research and development across all disciplines to enhance European competitiveness for the benefit of society. PRACE seeks to realize this mission by offering world-class computing and data management resources and services through a peer review process. Scientists and researchers from around the world can apply for access to PRACE resources.
What is Sigma2's role in PRACE?
Sigma2 is the Norwegian partner in this collaboration. The third parties for Sigma2 are the University of Oslo and the Norwegian University for Technology and Science.
The main role of Sigma2 is to govern and coordinate Norwegian participation on behalf of the partners. The coordinating activities consist of representing Norway in the governance structure of the collaborations (council and board), planning the Norwegian participation in the project work packages and the project funding management (i.e. the money flow from the international organizations and to the partners).
Our national e-infrastructure also enables us to give a valuable contribution to PRACE projects, e.g. Norway is leading the task on containerized services on HPC within PRACE 5IP.
The PRACE infrastructure is open to Norwegian researchers.
Successful Norwegian PRACE applications
Norway has had several successful projects running on PRACE Tier-0 systems.
- Project title: Dynamics of a solar active region
- Project leader: Boris Gudfiksen, UiO
- Research field: Universe Sciences
- Resource awarded: 72 million core hours
- Computer system: Macroni — KNL
Abstract
The solar corona is extremely hot. The temperature is more than 1 million degrees and no obvious heating mechanism is at play. The magnetic field of the sun is playing a big part in the heating of the corona, but so far we have not had a full understanding of how the sun can produce these enormous temperatures. In this project, we will simulate the hottest parts of the solar corona to understand the heating mechanism and to reveal if the same heating mechanism is at play everywhere or just in places where the solar magnetic field is the strongest.
- Project title: Emerging solar cell materials
- Project leader: Clas Persson, UiO
- Research field: Chemical Sciences and Materials
- Resource awarded: 16 million core hours
- Computer system: MareNostrum - BSC, Spain
Abstract
Reducing oil resources and increasing global energy consumption make the development of sustainable energy systems one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century. Taking into account a global interest in the reduction of CO2 levels, the development of solar cells is one of the main research priorities. Today, photovoltaics (PV) generate roughly 0.14 TW, which is only about 0.8% of the total energy consumption (~17 TW). To increase the PV capacity to a large extent, a large area of solar cell coverage is needed. This also requires the development of emerging solar cell materials, that have high efficiency, low cost, and good long-term stability.
In this project, we focus on the further understanding and development of thin film solar cell materials. Since the research groups together involve relatively many researchers, we define and form a project with two connected work packages (WPs):
WP1 Explore various high-absorbing Cu-based chalcogenides to search for alternative environmentally friendly compounds, with potentially advantageous material properties. WP2 Explore the properties of organic/inorganic hybrid systems and understand the potential of hybrid materials in solar cell application. The first principles studies of such materials require the calculations for systems containing more than 100 atoms as well as the modelling of complex structures (defect complexes, amorphous solids, etc.).
Moreover, since traditional density functional theory (DFT) calculations cannot describe band structures of the materials accurately, we will use hybrid functional and GW calculations. In this project, the combinations of different first principles methods, as well as our coding and method development experience, will allow us to perform a detailed study of emerging solar cell materials
- Project title: Gravitational waves from early universe phase transitions
- Project leader: David Weir, University of Stavanger
- Research field: Fundamental Constituents of Matter
- Resource awarded: 17 million core hours
- Computer system: Hornet - Gauss Centre for SuperComputing
Abstract
Understanding the development of the very early stages of the Big Bang is tightly linked to the understanding of the fundamental nature of matter and interactions. With the Large Hadron Collider delineating the nature of the Higgs, we have the opportunity to make predictions using the new knowledge, enabling a sharper picture of the very early universe.
In this project, we will use state-of-the-art high-performance computing to calculate the gravitational wave signal from a phase transition in the Higgs field in at around a tenth of a nanosecond after the Big Band, including the hydrodynamics of the hot plasma. This radiation may be observable in planned space-based gravitational wave detectors such as eLISA.
- Project title: Physics of the Solar Chromosphere
- Project leader: Mats Carlsson, UiO
- Research field: Universe Sciences
- Resource awarded: 34 million core hours
- Computer system: SuperMuc, GCS, Germany
Abstract
This project aims at a breakthrough in our understanding of the solar chromosphere by developing sophisticated radiation-magnetohydrodynamic simulations to interpret observations from the upcoming NASA SMEX mission Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS).
The enigmatic chromosphere is the transition between the solar surface and the eruptive outer solar atmosphere. The chromosphere harbours and constrains the mass and energy loading processes that define the heating of the corona, the acceleration and the composition of the solar wind, and the energetics and triggering of solar outbursts (filament eruptions, flares, coronal mass ejections) that govern near-Earth space weather and affect mankind”s technological environment.
Small-scale MHD processes play a pivotal role in defining the intricate fine structure and enormous dynamics of the chromosphere, controlling a reservoir of mass and energy much more than what is sent up into the corona. This project targets the intrinsic physics of the chromosphere to understand its mass and energy budgets and transfer mechanisms. Elucidating these is a principal quest of solar physics, a necessary step towards better space-weather prediction, and of interest to general astrophysics using the Sun as a close-up Rosetta-Stone star and plasma physics using the Sun and heliosphere as a nearby laboratory.
Our group is world-leading in modelling the solar atmosphere as one system; from the convection zone where the motions feed energy into the magnetic field and to the corona where the release of magnetic energy is more or less violent. The computational challenge is both in simplifying the complex physics without losing the main properties and in treating a large enough volume to encompass the large chromospheric structures with enough resolution to capture the dynamics of the system. We have developed a massively parallel code, called Bifrost, to tackle this challenge. The resulting simulations are very time-consuming but crucial for the understanding of the magnetic outer atmosphere of the Sun.
- Project title: Physics of the Solar Chromosphere
- Project leader: Mats Carlsson, UiO
- Research field: Universe Sciences
- Resource awarded: 21 million core hours
- Computer system: Hermit - HLRS
Abstract
This project aims at a breakthrough in our understanding of the solar chromosphere by developing sophisticated radiation-magnetohydrodynamic simulations.
The enigmatic chromosphere is the transition between the solar surface and the eruptive outer solar atmosphere. The chromosphere harbours and constrains the mass and energy loading processes that define the heating of the corona, the acceleration and the composition of the solar wind, and the energetics and triggering of solar outbursts (filament eruptions, flares, coronal mass ejections) that govern near-Earth space weather and affect mankind’s technological environment.
Small-scale MHD processes play a a pivotal role in defining the intricate fine structure and enormous dynamics of the chromosphere, controlling a reservoir of mass and energy much in excess of what is sent up into the corona. This project targets the intrinsic physics of the chromosphere to understand its mass and energy budgets and transfer mechanisms. Elucidating these is a principal quest of solar physics, a necessary step towards better space-weather prediction, and of interest to general astrophysics using the Sun as a close-up Rosetta-Stone star and plasma physics using the Sun and heliosphere as a nearby laboratory.
Our group is world-leading in modelling the solar atmosphere as one system; from the convection zone where the motions feed energy into the magnetic field and all the way to the corona where the release of magnetic energy is more or less violent. The computational challenge is both in simplifying the complex physics without loosing the main properties and in treating a large enough volume to encompass the large chromospheric structures with enough resolution to capture the dynamics of the system. We have developed a massively parallel code, called Bifrost, to tackle this challenge. The resulting simulations are very time-consuming but crucial for the understanding of the magnetic outer atmosphere of the Sun.
