SCIENCE

All technologies face barriers to uptake. The adoption of high performance computing (HPC) for engineering simulation is no exception. On the one hand, barriers to uptake may be the doubts a customer has about the real benefits of the technology. On the other hand, the technology offering may not have fully addressed the customer's needs. Open dialogue, hosted by an independent organization, can both help educate the user community regarding the true value of technology offerings and identify new market opportunities for participating vendors.

From May 23-26, 2011, in Boston, NAFEMS will be holding a special workshop titled "High Performance Computing for Engineering Simulation". This workshop is part of the biennial NAFEMS World Congress. The aim of the workshop is to promote discussion about the changing HPC landscape. Participants will include the users of engineering simulation software, those that develop it and those who provide the underlying hardware infrastructure.

NAFEMS is the international association for engineering simulation. It has a large international membership, spanning more than 950 organizations, from engineering companies and technology vendors to academia. NAFEMS provides an independent forum for developing and promoting best practice in engineering simulation. It achieves this by hosting technical working groups, regional groups and organizing awareness seminars and conferences.

In recent years, NAFEMS members have shown a growing interest in HPC. This is due to the rapidly changing technology landscape. Simulation professionals can now chose between various technologies including multicore processors, graphics processing units, grid computing and cloud computing. Members have many concerns including (i) Will my type of problem run more quickly using HPC? (ii) What type of hardware should I buy? (iii) How do I buy compute access as a service? (iv) What are the software licensing issues? (v) Is my data safe on the grid or cloud? (vi) Can my company access academic supercomputing facilities?

Encouraging a wider uptake of HPC in engineering simulation needs a many-way dialogue between potential users, software vendors, hardware vendors and service providers. The NAFEMS "High Performance Computing for Engineering Simulation" workshop will provide an independent forum for exchanging ideas that will benefit all those who participate.