High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart

High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart
Name	High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart
Established	1996
Location	Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany
Type	Research facility
Affiliation	University of Stuttgart, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology

High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart

The High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart is a major computational research facility in Stuttgart, Germany providing supercomputing resources to academic, industrial, and governmental projects. It supports simulation, data analysis, and modeling across disciplines and partners with universities, research institutes, and corporations to advance computational science and engineering. The center contributes to national and European initiatives and integrates into networks of high‑performance computing infrastructure.

Overview

The center operates as a regional hub linking the University of Stuttgart, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Max Planck Society, Fraunhofer Society, and industry partners such as Siemens, Bosch, Daimler AG, and Robert Bosch GmbH with national projects including Gauss Centre for Supercomputing and European programs like PRACE and EuroHPC. It hosts compute systems that serve research groups from institutions such as University of Tübingen, University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Technical University of Munich, RWTH Aachen University, Technical University of Berlin, University of Bonn, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), and Friedrich Schiller University Jena. The center collaborates with national centers including Jülich Research Centre and Leibniz Supercomputing Centre, and with international facilities like Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Argonne National Laboratory, CERN, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

History

Founded in the late 1990s, the center emerged from initiatives by the University of Stuttgart and regional ministries in Baden-Württemberg to consolidate computational resources for research and industry. Early cooperation included the Baden-Württemberg Stiftung and the Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron. Over time the center participated in national programs such as the German Research Foundation projects and European frameworks like the Framework Programme series and Horizon 2020. Milestones include hosting successive generations of supercomputers from vendors like IBM, Cray Inc., HPE, Fujitsu, and Bull (Atos) and joining the Gauss Centre for Supercomputing consortium. The center has been involved in notable scientific efforts tied to projects recognized by the German Research Council and collaborations with institutes such as the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems and Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research.

Facilities and Systems

Infrastructure includes machine rooms housing clustered systems, high‑performance storage arrays, and high‑speed interconnect fabrics from vendors such as Mellanox Technologies, Intel Corporation, NVIDIA, and AMD. The center deploys systems equipped with accelerators and CPUs from manufacturers like Intel, AMD, NVIDIA Corporation, and architectures influenced by ARM (company). Cooling and power solutions involve partnerships with companies including Siemens Energy and Schneider Electric. Storage and archive systems utilize technologies from EMC Corporation, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and NetApp. Network connectivity integrates with national research networks such as DFN (Germany), European Grid Infrastructure, and transnational backbones connecting to GÉANT. The center supports container and virtualization platforms referencing standards from OpenStack, Kubernetes, and software ecosystems from Canonical Ltd. and Red Hat, Inc..

Research and Applications

Research domains span computational fluid dynamics for partners like Rolls-Royce plc and Airbus, climate modeling connected to Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, astrophysics collaborations including Max Planck Institute for Astronomy and European Southern Observatory, computational chemistry with groups from Fritz Haber Institute, materials science with Helmholtz Association institutes, and biomedical simulation with hospitals such as University Hospital Stuttgart and research centers like German Cancer Research Center. Applications include large‑scale simulations for projects involving European Space Agency, Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt, and modeling efforts aligned with initiatives from European Molecular Biology Laboratory and Human Brain Project. The center supports machine learning and data analytics used by teams at Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Mathematics, Fraunhofer Institute for Algorithms and Scientific Computing, and Center for Data Science units at partner universities.

Software, Services, and User Support

Software stacks incorporate system software from SUSE Linux, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, scientific libraries such as MPI, OpenMP, PETSc, FFTW, and ecosystems including Python (programming language), R (programming language), TensorFlow, PyTorch, and Scikit-learn. The center provides user services like training and consultancy modeled after programs from PRACE Training Centre and documentation practices from Software Carpentry and Data Carpentry. It offers job scheduling with systems influenced by SLURM Workload Manager and PBS (Portable Batch System) families, and reproducibility support using tools linked to GitHub, GitLab, and Jupyter Project. User support teams liaise with principal investigators at institutions such as Max Planck Institutes, Fraunhofer Institutes, and university departments across Germany and Europe.

Collaborations and Partnerships

The center is a partner in national consortia including Gauss Centre for Supercomputing and collaborates with European initiatives like PRACE and EuroHPC Joint Undertaking. It runs joint projects with industry partners such as Siemens, Bosch, Daimler AG, Airbus, BASF, and Bayer AG, and research collaborations with institutes including Max Planck Society, Fraunhofer Society, Helmholtz Association, and Leibniz Association. International academic partners include ETH Zurich, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Imperial College London, University of Oxford, University of Cambridge, University of Edinburgh, Princeton University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University, and University of California, Berkeley.

Governance and Funding

Governance structures align with its founding institutions such as the University of Stuttgart and regional authorities in Baden-Württemberg and involve oversight mechanisms similar to other national centers funded through bodies like the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Germany) and the German Research Foundation. Funding sources include institutional contributions, project grants from Horizon 2020, Horizon Europe, collaborations funded by European Research Council awards, and partnerships with corporations including Siemens and Bosch. Strategic planning takes into account national roadmaps published by organizations such as Gauss Centre for Supercomputing and European strategies like those from European Commission initiatives.

Category:Supercomputer sites in Germany