ISSUE 1
VOLUME 3
YEAR 2010
INSIDE:
 CAVS R ECEIVES EPA
G RANT .................... 2
 A UTONOMIC COMPUTING
P ROJECT AT CCS ...... 2
Field
Points
 NATIONAL GIS DAY
E VENT IN 7 TH Y EAR
AT GRI ..................... 3
NEW SLETTER OF THE
HIGH PERFORMANCE COMPUTING COLLABORATORY
AT MISSISSIPPI STATE UNIVERSITY
HPC2 Participates in Internationally-recognized
SuperComputing Conference in New Orleans
The High Performance Computing
Collaboratory at MSU was recently showcased at an exhibit during the internationallyrecognized SuperComputing Conference in
New Orleans, LA. The HPC² exhibit included information about all of the HPC²
member centers, and was on display for the
week-long event and was visited by a diverse
community of participants including researchers, scientists, computing center staff
members, IT and data center management,
application developers, computer manufacturing personnel, program managers, journalists and congressional staffers.
New to the annual HPC² exhibit this
year was the Mississippi State University
award-winning EcoCAR student team. The
students placed first in the 2010 EcoCAR:
The NeXt Challenge finals in San Diego,
Calif. after designing and building an exceptional biodiesel extended-range electric vehicle (EREV) displayed at the conference.
The annual
SC Conference,
now in its 23nd
year, draws approximately
10,000
people
from around the world. SC is respected as the
premier global networking event for stakeholders throughout the high performance
computing ecosystem. SC10 featured exhibits from many international participants rep-
resenting industry, academia and government
research organizations. The technical program addressed virtually every area of scientific and engineering research, as well as
technological development, innovation, and
education.
HPC² Computing Office Administrator
Trey Breckenridge has actively served on
various SuperComputing conference committees dating back to 2006, this year serving on
the Executive Committee as Infrastructure
Co-Chair. In this position, he provided
managerial oversight for over 40 contractors
and volunteers
supporting conference security,
safety, electrical
and power systems,
audio/
visual systems,
catering, space
allocation, signage, general IT
activities,
the
conference information booth
and the conference office.
For
the
SC11
conference, Breckenridge will be in charge of the assignment and
allocation of space within the convention
center and contracted hotel facilities.
The High Performance Computing Collaboratory at Mississippi State University
is comprised of 4 research centers:
CAVS - Center for Advanced Vehicular Systems
CCS - Center for Computational Sciences
GRI - Geosystems Research Institute
NGI - Northern Gulf Institute
High Performance Computing Collaboratory, Mississippi State University
www.hpc.msstate.edu
Grant Funds Technology to Improve
Air Quality and Fuel Economy
The Center for Advanced Vehicular System's leadership with vehicle technology that promotes air quality, improved fuel economy and emissions reductions was recently
recognized during a special event on campus. The Environmental Protection Agency awarded CAVS a $1.08 million
grant as part of the National Clean Diesel Funding Assistance Program.
CAVS and its industry partners, Mississippi-based
KLLM Transport Services and Dufour Petroleum Inc., will
use the funding to install battery air conditioning systems on
a minimum of 101 trucks. The units will reduce diesel emissions significantly by allowing the driver to run air conditioning without idling the vehicle's engine. In addition to
installing the units on the partners' fleets, Mississippi State
will offer competitive mini-grants for installation of the idle
reduction technology for some independent truckers in the
state.
"This project is a perfect example of the positive economic and environmental impact that Mississippi State is
making in the state and region. We will also have a national
impact because of the cross-country routes many of our partners' trucks drive," said Michael Mazzola, the associate di-
rector for advanced vehicle systems at CAVS and the principal investigator on the EPA grant.
The award announcement took place at
the CAVS building in the
Thad Cochran Research,
Technology and Economic
Development Park, which
is adjacent to the Starkville campus. University
officials, industry executives and representatives
from the EPA and the
Mississippi Development
Authority were on hand
for the announcement.
NSF Grant to fund Center
for Autonomic Computing
A National Science Foundation grant will help fund a
project to engage Mississippi State faculty members and
industrial partners in research to accelerate autonomic computing knowledge creation and technology transfer.
Mississippi State will join the University of Florida,
the University of Arizona and Rutgers University in the
NSF CAC initiative, which started in 2008.
Dr. Ioana Banicescu and Dr. Sherif Abdelwahed will
coordinate all activities connected with this award through
the Center for Computational Sciences, a member of the
university’s High Performance Computing Collaboratory.
“In autonomic computing, the technology being used
adapts to available resources and workloads, and it anticipates user needs,” Banicescu said. “Developing smarter
autonomic computing solutions can reduce the costs of operating large-scale, self-managing systems, and also enhance the reliability and efficiency of applications running
on or the services hosted on these systems.”
“We are very excited about the possibilities that
MSU’s center will give our students and faculty, as well as
the opportunities for business and government to participate. The academic and economic development potential is
significant,” she explained.
High performance computing
(HPC) is the use of
advanced computational
techniques with large-scale
computational, storage,
networking, and/or
visualization resources to
solve problems that are too
complex for standard
computing solutions.
Today, HPC systems
typically perform in excess of
one trillion floating point
operations per second, or
www.hpc.msstate.edu
High Performance Computing Collaboratory, Mississippi State University
www.hpc.msstate.edu
GIS Day Celebrated
in 7th Year at MSU
GIS Day 2010, sponsored by the MSU’s Department of
Geosciences and Geosystems Research Institute, was held in
November at the High Performance Computing Collaboratory
building in the Thad Cochran Research, Technology and Economic Development Park, located across Highway 182 from
the university's campus.
Organizers planned an eventful morning of hands-on,
problem-solving activities for GIS Day at MSU, now in its
seventh year. Students learned about the vital role that geography plays in understanding natural disasters by using GIS
knowledge and technology to respond to a simulated flood.
More than 100 students from Lee Middle School in Columbus and the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science participated in GIS Day thanks to the Initiating New
Science Partnerships in Rural Education program at MSU,
which is funded by the National Science Foundation.
In addition to Mississippi State's event, GIS Day activities took place across the country that day as part of Geography Awareness Week in an effort to boost geographic education and to provide a showcase for GIS technologies that are
solving real-world problems and making a difference.
Construction begun on new
MSU Building to house NGI
Construction has begun on the new MSU Science and
Technology Building at Stennis Space Center. Earlier this
year, Sen. Thad Cochran said when complete the building
will allow the area to prepare for both natural and man-made
disasters. He hopes the presence of the facility will enable this
historically under-funded area of the nation to become better
funded. The building will be the new home for MSU’s
Northern Gulf Institute Program Office and other MSU offices.
MSU Vice President for Research and Economic Development Dr. David Shaw said the building will take upwards
of 24 months to build. “The building will allow MSU to bring
on more people to conduct coastal research, and show the
college has a commitment to furthering that research,” Shaw
said.
High Performance Computing Collaboratory, Mississippi State University
www.hpc.msstate.edu
Happy Holidays!
Mississippi State University will close for the holiday season
on Friday, December 17, 2010, and reopen on Monday, January 3, 2011.
High Performance
Computing Collaboratory
Box 9627
2 Research Blvd.
Mississippi State, MS 39762
High Performance Computing Collaboratory, Mississippi State University
www.hpc.msstate.edu