Thoughts About K4D: Where Does All the Computer Power Go?

Saturday, September 13, 2008

Where Does All the Computer Power Go?

There is a new publication of the National Academies of Science titled "The Potential Impact of High-End Capability Computing on Four Fields of Science and Engineering".
Committee on the Potential Impact of High-End Computing on Illustrative Fields of Science and Engineering, National Research Council, 2008

Description: The study considered, as examples, four fields of science and engineering to determine which of their major challenges are critically dependent on high-end capability computing (HECC):

1. atmospheric science
2. astrophysics
3. chemical separations
4. evolutionary biology

While this study does identify the potential impact of High End Computing Capacity in these four fields, and thus implicitly identifies some potential funding opportunities, that is not the goal, and this study is no substitute for competitive review of specific proposals. Rather, the study is meant to illustrate the sort of examination that any field or federal agency could undertake in order to analyze the HECC infrastructure it needs to support progress toward its research goals, within the context of other means of attacking those goals.

Comment: This book provides another example of the importance of computer facilities that are beyond the budget of poor nations. JAD