Edinburgh DiRAC Resource Grant
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Edinburgh
Department Name: Sch of Physics and Astronomy
Abstract
DiRAC (Distributed Research utilising Advanced Computing) is the integrated supercomputing facility for theoretical modelling and HPC-based research in particle physics, nuclear physics, astronomy and cosmology, areas in which the UK is world-leading. It was funded as a result of investment of £12.32 million, from the Government's Large Facilities Capital Fund, together with investment from STFC and from universities. In 2012, the DiRAC facility was upgraded with a further £15 million capital investment from government (DiRAC-2).
The DiRAC facility provides a variety of computer architectures, matching machine architecture to the algorithm design and requirements of the research problems to be solved. The science facilitated includes: using supercomputers to enable scientists to calculate what theories of the early universe predict and to test them against observations of the present universe; undertaking lattice field theory calculations whose primary aim is to increase the predictive power of the Standard Model of elementary particle interactions through numerical simulation of Quantum Chromodynamics; carrying out state-of-the-art cosmological simulations, including the large-scale distribution of dark matter, the formation of dark matter haloes, the formation and evolution of galaxies and clusters, the physics of the intergalactic medium and the properties of the intracluster gas.
This grant is to support the continued operation of the DiRAC facilities until 2017 to ensure that the UK remains one of the world-leaders of theoretical modelling in particle physics, astronomy and cosmology.
The DiRAC facility provides a variety of computer architectures, matching machine architecture to the algorithm design and requirements of the research problems to be solved. The science facilitated includes: using supercomputers to enable scientists to calculate what theories of the early universe predict and to test them against observations of the present universe; undertaking lattice field theory calculations whose primary aim is to increase the predictive power of the Standard Model of elementary particle interactions through numerical simulation of Quantum Chromodynamics; carrying out state-of-the-art cosmological simulations, including the large-scale distribution of dark matter, the formation of dark matter haloes, the formation and evolution of galaxies and clusters, the physics of the intergalactic medium and the properties of the intracluster gas.
This grant is to support the continued operation of the DiRAC facilities until 2017 to ensure that the UK remains one of the world-leaders of theoretical modelling in particle physics, astronomy and cosmology.
Planned Impact
The high-performance computing applications supported by DiRAC typically involve new algorithms and implementations optimised for high energy efficiency which impose demands on computer architectures that the computing industry has found useful for hardware and system software design and testing.
DiRAC researchers have on-going collaborations with computing companies that maintain this strong connection between the scientific goals of the DiRAC Consortium and the development of new computing technologies that drive the commercial high-performance computing market, with economic benefits to the companies involved and more powerful computing capabilities available to other application areas including many that address socio-economic challenges.
DiRAC researchers have on-going collaborations with computing companies that maintain this strong connection between the scientific goals of the DiRAC Consortium and the development of new computing technologies that drive the commercial high-performance computing market, with economic benefits to the companies involved and more powerful computing capabilities available to other application areas including many that address socio-economic challenges.
People |
ORCID iD |
| Richard Kenway (Principal Investigator) | |
| Peter Boyle (Co-Investigator) |
Publications
Pezzella M
(2021)
A method for calculating temperature-dependent photodissociation cross sections and rates.
in Physical chemistry chemical physics : PCCP
Wareing C.J.
(2021)
Striations, integrals, hourglasses, and collapse - thermal instability driven magnetic simulations of molecular clouds
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Grisdale K
(2021)
Physical properties and scaling relations of molecular clouds: the impact of star formation
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Karunakaran A
(2021)
Satellites around Milky Way Analogs: Tension in the Number and Fraction of Quiescent Satellites Seen in Observations versus Simulations
in The Astrophysical Journal Letters
Benitez-Llambay A
(2021)
The Tail of Late-forming Dwarf Galaxies in ?CDM
in The Astrophysical Journal Letters
Agudelo Rueda J
(2021)
Three-dimensional magnetic reconnection in particle-in-cell simulations of anisotropic plasma turbulence
in Journal of Plasma Physics
Lovell M
(2021)
The spatial distribution of Milky Way satellites, gaps in streams, and the nature of dark matter
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Czakon M
(2021)
Next-to-Next-to-Leading Order Study of Three-Jet Production at the LHC.
in Physical review letters
Yip K
(2021)
Peeking inside the Black Box: Interpreting Deep-learning Models for Exoplanet Atmospheric Retrievals
in The Astronomical Journal
Kordov Z
(2021)
State mixing and masses of the p 0 , ? and ? ' mesons from n f = 1 + 1 + 1 lattice QCD + QED
in Physical Review D
Igoshev A
(2021)
Combined analysis of neutron star natal kicks using proper motions and parallax measurements for radio pulsars and Be X-ray binaries
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Ryan S
(2021)
Excited and exotic bottomonium spectroscopy from lattice QCD
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Williams C
(2021)
ALMA Measures Rapidly Depleted Molecular Gas Reservoirs in Massive Quiescent Galaxies at z ~ 1.5
in The Astrophysical Journal
Bartlett D
(2021)
Calibrating galaxy formation effects in galactic tests of fundamental physics
in Physical Review D
Mellor T
(2021)
Artificial Symmetries for Calculating Vibrational Energies of Linear Molecules
in Symmetry
MacTaggart D
(2021)
Direct evidence that twisted flux tube emergence creates solar active regions.
in Nature communications
Jones C
(2021)
Fully developed anelastic convection with no-slip boundaries
in Journal of Fluid Mechanics
Al-Refaie A
(2021)
TauREx 3: A Fast, Dynamic, and Extendable Framework for Retrievals
in The Astrophysical Journal
Guandalin C
(2021)
Observing relativistic features in large-scale structure surveys - I. Multipoles of the power spectrum
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Chan T
(2021)
Smoothed particle radiation hydrodynamics: two-moment method with local Eddington tensor closure
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Ballabio G
(2021)
HD 143006: circumbinary planet or misaligned disc?
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Izquierdo A
(2021)
The Disc Miner I. A statistical framework to detect and quantify kinematical perturbations driven by young planets in discs
in Astronomy & Astrophysics
Rogers J
(2021)
Unveiling the planet population at birth
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Mitchell M
(2021)
The impact of modified gravity on the Sunyaev-Zeldovich effect
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Martin-Alvarez S
(2021)
Unravelling the origin of magnetic fields in galaxies
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Woss A
(2021)
Decays of an exotic 1 - + hybrid meson resonance in QCD
in Physical Review D
Al-Refaie A
(2021)
TauREx 3: A Fast, Dynamic, and Extendable Framework for Retrievals
in The Astrophysical Journal
Rogers J
(2021)
Unveiling the planet population at birth
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Appleby S
(2021)
The low-redshift circumgalactic medium in simba
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Theuns T
(2021)
Connecting cosmological accretion to strong Ly a absorbers
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Nightingale J
(2021)
PyAutoLens: Open-Source Strong Gravitational Lensing
in Journal of Open Source Software
Raj A
(2021)
Disk Tearing: Numerical Investigation of Warped Disk Instability
in The Astrophysical Journal
Poncelet R
(2021)
NNLO QCD study of polarised W+W- production at the LHC
in Journal of High Energy Physics
Suarez T
(2021)
Modelling intergalactic low ionization metal absorption line systems near the epoch of reionization
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Moews B
(2021)
Hybrid analytic and machine-learned baryonic property insertion into galactic dark matter haloes
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Kalaghatgi C
(2021)
Investigating the effect of in-plane spin directions for precessing binary black hole systems
in Physical Review D
Parrott W
(2021)
Toward accurate form factors for B -to-light meson decay from lattice QCD
in Physical Review D
Vandenbroucke B
(2021)
Polarised emission from aligned dust grains in nearby galaxies: Predictions from the Auriga simulations
in Astronomy & Astrophysics
Allanson O
(2021)
Electron Diffusion and Advection During Nonlinear Interactions With Whistler-Mode Waves
in Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics
Nixon C
(2021)
Accretion discs with non-zero central torque
in New Astronomy
Dutta R
(2021)
Metal-enriched halo gas across galaxy overdensities over the last 10 billion years
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Gaikwad P
(2021)
A consistent and robust measurement of the thermal state of the IGM at 2 = z = 4 from a large sample of Ly a forest spectra: evidence for late and rapid He ii reionization
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Hughes M
(2021)
What to expect when using globular clusters as tracers of the total mass distribution in Milky Way-mass galaxies
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Yardley S
(2021)
Simulating the Coronal Evolution of Bipolar Active Regions to Investigate the Formation of Flux Ropes
in Solar Physics
Robertson A
(2021)
The surprising accuracy of isothermal Jeans modelling of self-interacting dark matter density profiles
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Santos-Santos I
(2021)
Magellanic satellites in ?CDM cosmological hydrodynamical simulations of the Local Group
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Katsianis A
(2021)
The specific star formation rate function at different mass scales and quenching: a comparison between cosmological models and SDSS
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Hernández-Aguayo C
(2021)
Galaxy formation in the brane world I: overview and first results
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Ganeshaiah Veena P
(2021)
Cosmic Ballet III: Halo spin evolution in the cosmic web
in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
Raj A
(2021)
Disk Tearing: Implications for Black Hole Accretion and AGN Variability
in The Astrophysical Journal
| Description | In December 2009, the STFC Facility, DiRAC, was established to provide distributed High Performance Computing (HPC) services for theoretical modelling and HPC-based research in particle physics, astronomy and cosmology. DiRAC provides a variety of computer architectures, matching machine architecture to the algorithm design and requirements of the research problems to be solved. This grant funds the continued operation of the 1.3Pflop/s Blue Gene/Q system at the University of Edinburgh, which was co-developed by Peter Boyle (University of Edinburgh) and IBM to run with high energy efficiency for months at a time on a single problem to solve some of the most complex problems in physics, particularly the strong interactions of quarks and gluons. The DiRAC Facility supports over 250 active researchers at 27 UK HEIs. This includes the research projects of 100 funded research staff (PDRAs and Research Fellows), over 50 post-graduate projects, and £1.6M of funded research grants. |
| Exploitation Route | Theoretical results obtained input to a range of experimental programmes aiming to increase our understanding of Nature. Algorithms and software developed provide input to computer design. |
| Sectors | Digital/Communication/Information Technologies (including Software) |
| URL | http://dirac.ac.uk/ |
| Description | Intel IPAG QCD codesign project |
| Organisation | Intel Corporation |
| Department | Intel Corporation (Jones Farm) |
| Country | United States |
| Sector | Private |
| PI Contribution | We have collaborated with Intel corporation since 2014 with $720k of total direct funding, starting initially as an Intel parallel computing centre, and expanding to direct close collaboration with Intel Pathfinding and Architecture Group. |
| Collaborator Contribution | We have performed detailed optimisation of QCD codes (Wilson, Domain Wall, Staggered) on Intel many core architectures. We have investigated the memory system and interconnect performance, particularly on Intel's latest interconnect hardware called Omnipath. We found serious performance issues and worked with Intel to plan a solution and this has been verified and is available as beta software. It will reach general availability in the Intel MPI 2019 release, and allow threaded concurrent communications in MPI for the first time. A joint paper on the resolution to this was written with the Intel MPI team, and the application of the same QCD programming techniques to machine learning gradient reduction was applied in the paper to the Baidu Research all reduce library, demonstrating a 10x gain for this critical step in machine learning in clustered environments. We are also working with Intel verifying future architectures that will deliver the exascale performance in 2021. |
| Impact | We have performed detailed optimisation of QCD codes (Wilson, Domain Wall, Staggered) on Intel many core architectures. We have investigated the memory system and interconnect performance, particularly on Intel's latest interconnect hardware called Omnipath. We found serious performance issues and worked with Intel to plan a solution and this has been verified and is available as beta software. It will reach general availability in the Intel MPI 2019 release, and allow threaded concurrent communications in MPI for the first time. A joint paper on the resolution to this was written with the Intel MPI team, and the application of the same QCD programming techniques to machine learning gradient reduction was applied in the paper to the Baidu Research all reduce library, demonstrating a 10x gain for this critical step in machine learning in clustered environments. This collaboration has been renewed annually in 2018, 2019, 2020. Two DiRAC RSE's were hired by Intel to work on the Turing collaboration. |
| Start Year | 2016 |