Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Parallel HPC Reaches for the Stars

High-performance parallel computing is taking off – literally. NASA and the U.S. Air Force have begun development of the Next Generation Space Processor (NGSP). The brain behind future space missions, NGSP will provide a minimum of 24 processor cores to support both highly parallel applications and precise power management, fault tolerance and program unit distribution, the agencies say.

(Read my complete blog on the topic at GoParallel)

Best, Bightest Parallel Students Work for "Betterment of Life on Earth"

Who will help create the next-generation of faster, higher resolution parallel computing models to help counter climate change, global warming and ozone layer damage? A good bet is one of the 11 student standouts recently chosen for prestigious summer internships in parallel computational science by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). The University of Wyoming claimed three spots – the only college or university to claim multiple honors, according to NCAR.

(Read my complete blog on the topic at GoParallel)

Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Mixing Code Can Draw Penalty Flags

Parallel processing performance penalties can be pretty painful. Any developer that has tried to mix code in the single-precision and double-precision pipelines in the coprocessor knows this first hand. For good advice on how to avoid such mistakes, check out the recently published  “Intel Xeon Phi Coprocessor Vector Architecture”.  The report will help you better understand how SP instructions can come to your rescue, enabling good performance results.

(Read my complete blog on the topic at GoParallel)

Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Parallel Success Starts With Proper Planning

"Measure twice; cut once.” That maxim of carpentry is also good advice for parallel programming, according to a recent technical paper from Intel. Taking maximum advantage of a Many Integrated Core (MIC) coprocessor requires careful design of algorithm, data structure and architecture, warns “Intel Xeon Phi Application Design and Implementation Considerations.”

(Read my complete blog on the topic at GoParallel)

M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet

In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M.

(See my complete blog on the topic at InternetEvolution)

Friday, May 17, 2013

Wanted: Energy-Efficient Supercomputers

Who says super-fast computing has to be energy-wasting computing? That challenging question is at the core of a discussion workshop on large-scale parallel processing at the IEEE International Parallel and Distributed Processing Symposium in Boston May 20-24.

(Read my complete blog on the topic at goparallel.sourceforge.net)

Thursday, May 16, 2013

Data Deluge Bottlenecking Breakthroughs

Data complexity and lack of scalability of underlying algorithms is bottlenecking the nation’s ability to analyze and apply massive amounts of science and engineering data for new breakthroughs, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. The DOE says translating the unprecedented flow of data from experiments and simulations – much of it generated by massively parallel computers – requires  “fundamentally different techniques, tools, and approaches.”

(See my complete blog on the topic at goparallel.sourceforge.net)

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Finding the ROI in workplace wellness

To read the headlines, it’s a wonder if anyone knows what to really make of wellness programs.

“Corporate wellness programs: Not quite the cost savers”
 
“Wellness programs show hard-dollar savings”

“Study shows no quick savings from wellness programs”

“Employee wellness programs provide significant savings over time”

“How can an employer tell if its corporate wellness program is really working?”

Clearly, there is plenty of disagreement on the topic. It may be due to a lack of historical data. That may be why more than 75 percent of respondents to a recent survey by the National Business Group on Health said they do not know their return on investment for wellness programs.

(See my complete blog on the topic at Healthcare Finance News)

Saturday, May 11, 2013

HPC Drives Life Science Research at Texas Supercomputing Center

Life science accounts for a key segment of the 3,000 research scientists in astronomy, biology, chemistry, physics, aerospace engineering, petroleum engineering and geosciences using the Stampede supercomputer system at the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) at the University of Texas, Austin. “Oscar” Jiao, the center’s life science computing specialist, recently sat down with the Go Parallel Editor Joe Maglitta to talk about how researchers are using the nine-petaflop supercomputer to pursue new discoveries in their fields.

(See the video interview at http://goparallel.sourceforge.net)

Thursday, May 9, 2013

Barcelona Supercomputing Center Joins OpenMP board

Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC) has joined the OpenMP Architecture Review Board (ARB), a consortium of 24 vendors and research organizations creating the standard for world’s most popular shared-memory parallel programming model.

(Read my complete blog on the topic at goparallel.sourceforge.net)

Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Harnessing BioMed Big Data with Parallel, Cloud

Parallel and grid provide computational power and storage to face the new flood of biomedical and healthcare data, but need coupling with cloud computing to reduce analysis costs, simplify related IT infrastructures and change the very models of research and healthcare provision.

That’s according to the luminary organizers of the 2nd International Workshop onParallel and Cloud-based Bioinformatics and Biomedicine (ParBio) set for September 22-25, 2013 in Washington, D.C.

(See my complete blog, with Joseph Maglitta, on the topic at http://goparallel.sourceforge.net)

$1,734 Helps You Master Parallel Universe

Mystified by aspects of parallel computing? You’re not alone. But take heart.  Advance orders are being taken on Amazon.com for a massive four-volume “Encyclopedia of Parallel Computing” that costs a mere $1,734.81.

Yes, you read the price correctly.  Relatively speaking, that’s a bargain. The four hardcover books and companion eReference tool normally sell for $2,050, but Amazon offers a 15% discount, bringing the price to $1,734.81.

(Read my complete blog on the topic at http://goparallel.sourceforge.net)

Tuesday, May 7, 2013

Change of Plans -- Anthony Scaglione (AFP practioner profile)

As a top financial executive, Anthony Scaglione says that getting peers to see eye-to-eye and work toward common objectives can often feel like pulling teeth. It’s an appropriate image for this treasury executive, who originally had his sights on a career in dentistry.
 
“When I went to college I wanted to be a dentist,” Scaglione revealed. But he soon discovered that working on other people’s teeth wasn’t really for him. “After one bio class, I switched to finance.”
(Read my complete profile in Exchange Magazine, at www.afponline.org)
 

Office Politics

The power of the purse is critical to governing — some even say it is the key. Not surprisingly, state, municipal and local treasurers understand this better than just about anybody in government.

What is surprising, however, is that government treasurers are increasingly running for higher office — and winning.
 
(Read my complete article in Exchange Magazine, at www.afponline.org)
 

Aim HIGH

Alison Cornell has her sights set on being the best CFO on the planet.

Cornell, CTP, is chief financial officer for Covance Inc., a $2 billion public drug development
services company in Princeton, NJ, with global operations in more than 30 countries.
 
(Read my complete article at in Exchange Magazine, at www.afponline.org)