Chemical reactions facilitated by catalysts are crucial to many industrial processes. Although many catalysts used in industry work just fine, researchers at PNNL want them to reach their full potential. Using supercomputing simulations (done partly at NERSC) and laboratory experiments they found that placing protons in the right spots avoids wasting time-and-energy on profligate reactions. More>
Posts Tagged ‘National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC)’
Supercomputers Help a Catalyst Reach its Full Potential
Tuesday, May 7th, 2013NERSC Intern Wins Award for Computing Achievement
Wednesday, April 3rd, 2013
Stephanie Cabanela, a student intern in NERSC’s Operation Technologies Group, was honored with a National Center for Women and Information Technology Aspirations in Computing award last month. The award honors young women at the high school level for their computing-related achievements and interests. A senior classman at Lowell High School in San Francisco, Cabanela was one of hundreds in the Bay Area to compete for this award. More>
Computer Simulations Yield Clues to How Cells Interact With Surroundings
Monday, March 25th, 2013
Mohammad Mofrad of the Physical Biosciences Division led the development of a computer model of a protein that helps cells interact with their surroundings. The simulations, some of which run on NERSC, are shedding light on how the protein, called integrin, connects a cell’s inner and outer environments. The scientists report their research in a recent issue of PLoS Computational Biology. Their molecular dynamics model is the latest example of computational biology, in which scientists use computers to analyze biological phenomena for insights that may not be available via experiment. More>
Planck Results Point to an Older, Slower Universe
Thursday, March 21st, 2013
Press conferences in Europe and the U.S. this morning announced the first cosmological results of the Planck mission to map the cosmic microwave background at the highest level of detail ever achieved. The new data reveal a universe that is accelerating but is older and expanding more slowly than previously thought. It also contains more matter and less dark energy. Berkeley Lab physicists and computer scientists have played a major role in Planck.
The Art of Science: Photos Show the Inner Workings of NERSC
Tuesday, March 19th, 2013
Henrik Nordberg, a software architect for the Joint Genome Institute, is responsible for making the data that JGI generates available to the research community and the public. This requires computers, such as those run by the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center. Nordberg, who is also a member of the Lab’s Photo Club, happen to be at NERSC for a work assignment, but was so taken by the machinery, he pulled out his camera and took these abstract shots. Do you have artistic interpretations of research at the Lab? If so, share them here.
NERSC Builds the Massive Simulations Essential to Planck Results
Monday, March 18th, 2013
The Planck collaboration will soon release its first cosmological results, based on trillions of measurements of the cosmic microwave background. Millions of hours of massively parallel processing at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) went into the effort, with Lab scientists working closely with members of the U.S. and international Planck teams to quantify uncertainties and correct biases. A Computational Cosmology Center group led by Julian Borrill and including Reijo Keskitalo, Aaron Collier, and Ted Kisner of the Computational Research Division generated a quarter of a million simulated maps of the Planck sky, essential to the analysis. More>
NERSC Announces Winners of Inaugural HPC Achievement Awards
Wednesday, February 20th, 2013
The Department of Energy’s National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) announced the winners of their inaugural High Performance Computing (HPC) Achievement Awards on Wednesday at the annual NERSC User Group meeting. These awards recognize NERSC users who have either demonstrated an innovative use of HPC resources to solve a scientific problem, or whose work has had an exceptional impact on scientific understanding or society. Among the winners was Peter Nugent of the Computational Research Division (pictured). More>
Learn More About High Performance Computing at Today’s NUG 2013 User Day
Wednesday, February 13th, 2013NERSC invites Berkeley Lab and UC Berkeley staff and students to NUG 2013 at Berkeley Lab. The all day event will take place in the Building 50 Auditorium today, and will focus on trends in HPC and NERSC users’ experiences. Included are sessions on trends, discovery, and innovation in high performance computing. Go here to learn more and register. The sessions will also be streamed live.
NERSC Helps Explain the Big Freeze
Tuesday, February 5th, 2013
Scientists suspect that about 13,000 years ago, a catastrophic injection of freshwater into the North Atlantic “conveyor,” which transports warm tropical water northward, triggered a major cold spell—known as the Younger Dryas or Big Freeze. But until recently, nobody could fully explain how the freshwater got there. Using supercomputers at NERSC, two researchers may have finally solved this mystery. More>
NERSC Helps Develop the Next-Generation of Batteries
Thursday, December 20th, 2012
As part of DOE’s new Batteries and Energy Storage Hub, researchers will use NERSC resources to predict the properties of electrolytes. When the center is up and running, collaborators will be able to combine their results with the existing Materials Project to get a complete scope of battery components. Together these tools allow researchers to employ a systematic and predictive approach to battery design. Berkeley Lab is a major contributor to this collaboration and will be leading the computational modeling effort. More>
