Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC)

Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC)
Name	Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC)
Formation	2001
Purpose	Accelerate scientific discovery through high-performance computing
Region served	United States
Parent organization	United States Department of Energy

Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC) Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC) is a United States Department of Energy initiative that integrates high-performance computing resources, numerical algorithms, and domain science to accelerate discovery in large-scale scientific problems. The program funds multi-institutional teams, supports national laboratories' capabilities, and coordinates with federal agencies to address computational bottlenecks in physical sciences and engineering. SciDAC has influenced research agendas across national laboratories, universities, and private-sector partners by promoting co-design of software and hardware for grand-challenge simulations.

Overview and Objectives

SciDAC aims to enable transformative scientific results by combining advanced computing, applied mathematics, and domain expertise from institutions such as Argonne National Laboratory, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and Sandia National Laboratories. Objectives include developing scalable algorithms and community software stacks for projects associated with National Nuclear Security Administration, Office of Science (United States Department of Energy), Advanced Scientific Computing Research, and initiatives aligned with President of the United States science priorities. The program emphasizes workforce development through collaborations with Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University, University of California, Berkeley, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and other research universities. SciDAC fosters synergy with international facilities like CERN, European Organisation for Nuclear Research, and partnerships involving NVIDIA, Intel Corporation, and Cray Inc..

History and Program Evolution

SciDAC was launched in 2001 under leadership connected to the United States Department of Energy and evolved through funding cycles reflecting shifting computational paradigms influenced by milestones at Los Alamos National Laboratory and Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Early phases prioritized petascale readiness informed by projects at Argonne National Laboratory and collaborations with National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center and Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility. The program adapted to exascale objectives during the Barack Obama administration and coordinated with exascale procurements such as systems acquired by Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Argonne National Laboratory under directives from United States Congress appropriations. SciDAC's strategic pivots have reflected technological changes driven by companies like IBM, Hewlett-Packard Enterprise, and AMD and scientific priorities articulated by panels including the National Research Council and the Office of Science and Technology Policy.

Research Areas and Scientific Campaigns

Research spans computational astrophysics, climate modeling, fusion energy, accelerator science, materials discovery, and nuclear physics with campaigns often aligned with projects at Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and NOAA. SciDAC-supported efforts include multi-physics codes used in programs at General Atomics, work relevant to ITER fusion experiments, and simulations informing investigations at Brookhaven National Laboratory and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Scientific campaigns have included collaborations addressing Large Hadron Collider-scale data analysis, cosmology simulations tied to NASA missions, and materials research relevant to initiatives by Department of Defense laboratories and industrial partners like General Electric and Siemens.

Computational Technologies and Infrastructure

SciDAC investments have targeted software frameworks, scalable solvers, and performance-portable libraries implemented on leadership-class systems such as those at Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility, Argonne Leadership Computing Facility, and National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center. Technologies include task-based runtimes influenced by projects involving Cray Inc. and LLNL architectures, GPU-accelerated kernels developed in cooperation with NVIDIA Corporation and compiler support from Intel Corporation. The program advanced community codes and stack components interoperable with middleware from OpenMP Architecture Review Board, Message Passing Interface, and vendor ecosystems like Red Hat and Microsoft. Data management and visualization efforts linked to SciDAC engaged tools and centers such as Visualization Sciences Group, NERSC, and collaborations with Google cloud research teams.

Partnerships and Collaborations

SciDAC operates through consortia that include national laboratories, academic institutions, industry partners, and international laboratories such as CERN and Rutherford Appleton Laboratory. Formal collaborations have involved University of Chicago, California Institute of Technology, Yale University, Columbia University, Princeton University, and private firms including IBM, Intel Corporation, NVIDIA Corporation, and HPE. Interagency coordination included interactions with National Aeronautics and Space Administration, National Science Foundation, and National Institutes of Health on cross-cutting computational challenges. SciDAC-led centers have hosted visiting scientists from institutions like Imperial College London and ETH Zurich and participated in joint workshops with organizations such as ACM and IEEE.

Impact and Notable Achievements

SciDAC-funded projects have produced influential community codes, scalable numerical methods, and scientific results cited in research from Nature (journal), Science (journal), and domain journals tied to Physical Review Letters and Journal of Computational Physics. Achievements include contributions to predictive climate simulations informing Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports, materials simulations that accelerated discoveries linked to industrial partners such as Boeing and Dow Chemical Company, and fusion modeling that supported research for ITER. SciDAC outcomes influenced architectures and procurements at national computing facilities and helped train scientists who have taken positions at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, University of Michigan, and Cornell University. The program's legacy includes a sustained community of practice connecting experts from Los Alamos National Laboratory, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Argonne National Laboratory, and leading universities to address evolving grand-challenge problems.

Category:United States Department of Energy