PDC Center for High Performance Computing

PDC Center for High Performance Computing
Name	PDC Center for High Performance Computing
Formation	1990s
Founder	Royal Institute of Technology
Type	Research infrastructure
Location	KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm
Region served	Sweden, Europe
Leader title	Director
Parent organization	KTH Royal Institute of Technology

PDC Center for High Performance Computing is a Swedish national high-performance computing facility hosted at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. It provides supercomputing resources, data services, and expertise to researchers across disciplines, supporting projects linked to institutions such as the Swedish Research Council, European Union frameworks, and collaborations with entities like CERN and European Space Agency. The center participates in national initiatives alongside organizations such as SNIC and international infrastructures like PRACE and EuroHPC.

History

The center traces roots to compute facilities at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in the 1990s, expanding through partnerships with Stockholm University, the Royal Institute of Technology network, and national bodies such as the Swedish Research Council and Vinnova. Early procurements were informed by trends from institutions like Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Argonne National Laboratory, and Los Alamos National Laboratory. Over time the facility upgraded architectures influenced by procurements from vendors comparable to Cray Inc., IBM, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and NVIDIA. Strategic collaborations involved European initiatives including PRACE and projects funded under the Horizon 2020 programme and later Horizon Europe. Milestones included deployment of multi-core clusters, adoption of GPU-accelerated nodes inspired by platforms at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and integration into national research infrastructures akin to Gauss Centre for Supercomputing partnerships.

Facilities and Infrastructure

The center operates multiple compute clusters, storage arrays, and networking fabric comparable in concept to installations at CERN, Max Planck Society compute centers, and the Swiss National Supercomputing Centre. Hardware generations include CPU-based nodes with processors from families like AMD EPYC and Intel Xeon, GPU nodes leveraging accelerators such as NVIDIA A100 and interconnects resembling InfiniBand topologies. Parallel filesystems mirror deployments like Lustre and GPFS used at Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron and European Molecular Biology Laboratory. The facility houses specialized resources for workflows similar to those at EMBL and Wellcome Sanger Institute, with large capacity object storage for projects akin to Human Genome Project data management and tape archives following models used by ESRF and MAX IV Laboratory. Networking interconnects tie into national research and education networks such as SUNET and pan-European backbones like GÉANT.

Research and Services

Services include batch scheduling, interactive development environments, and porting expertise comparable to support at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, National Center for Supercomputing Applications, and Los Alamos National Laboratory. Research enabled spans computational chemistry, climate modelling, bioinformatics, and machine learning, reflecting work at European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, and European Bioinformatics Institute. Software support covers packages like GROMACS, LAMMPS, OpenFOAM, and deep learning frameworks used at DeepMind and Google Research. The center provides consultancy for performance tuning, parallelization strategies inspired by practices from Sandia National Laboratories and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and reproducible workflows adopting standards advanced by FAIR Principles advocates and projects related to ELIXIR.

User Community and Access

User base comprises researchers and engineers from universities such as Karolinska Institutet, Uppsala University, Lund University, and institutes like the Stockholm University Department of Meteorology, with projects funded by agencies including the Swedish Research Council, Vetenskapsrådet, and industry partners like Ericsson, Volvo, and ABB. Access modalities follow peer-reviewed allocations similar to processes at PRACE and national nodes like CSC – IT Center for Science in Finland. The center supports startup incubators and collaborations with companies in the European Innovation Council ecosystem, and participates in consortia with research infrastructures such as SNIC and NordForsk programs.

Education, Training, and Outreach

Training offerings mirror curricula from organizations like Software Carpentry and Carpentries with workshops in parallel programming, performance profiling, and containerization akin to Docker and Singularity training at centers including EPCC and ICS groups. Outreach engages students from KTH Royal Institute of Technology, secondary schools in Stockholm County, and public science events similar to ForskarFredag and collaborations with museums like the National Museum of Science and Technology (Stockholm). The center contributes to doctoral education connected with graduate programs at KTH Royal Institute of Technology and international summer schools comparable to PRACE Advanced Training Centre offerings.

Governance and Funding

Governance involves oversight by units within KTH Royal Institute of Technology alongside advisory boards including stakeholders from Stockholm University, Swedish National Infrastructure for Computing (SNIC), and representatives from funding bodies such as Vinnova and the Swedish Research Council. Funding derives from national research infrastructure grants, competitive projects under Horizon Europe, institutional support from KTH Royal Institute of Technology, and collaborative contracts with industry partners including Siemens and ABB. Strategic direction aligns with national priorities coordinated with organizations like The Swedish Higher Education Authority and cross-European planning bodies including EuroHPC JU.

Category:Supercomputer sites Category:KTH Royal Institute of Technology Category:Research infrastructure in Sweden