National Partnership for Advanced Computational Infrastructure

该行动执行NSF与加州大学圣地亚哥分校（UCSD）的高级计算基础设施国家合作伙伴关系（NPACI）之间的合作协议，由Sid Karin博士通过NSF奖项ASC 9619020指导。该合作协议将运行五年，是提交给NSF招标的提案的结果，“高级计算基础设施合作伙伴关系”（PACI），NSF 96-31。 PACI计划建立在1985年建立的NSF超级计算机中心计划的基础上，并取代了该计划，该计划专注于高性能计算和通信领域的新兴机会，提供灵活性，以适应快速发展的环境并满足高端计算的需求，以使美国在计算科学和工程领域继续保持世界领先地位。 NSF将通过该计划为研究人员提供高性能计算系统的访问权限，以及开发和优化其使用所需的相关训练有素的工作人员和研究人员。 可扩展的并行系统、高性能联网和高带宽以及大容量存储系统的出现为国家基础设施创造了机会，该国家基础设施由多个地理上分布的站点组成，这些站点通过高速通信网络与高端计算资源以及彼此强耦合。 NPACI将领导国家级元计算环境的部署和发展，这将有利于计算科学和工程所有领域的国家用户社区。该基础设施将整合计算和数据服务器，并利用计算机和计算科学家的人才来指导其发展。它将利用许多项目的活动。元计算环境将得到扩展，不仅能够进行数值密集型计算，而且还能够进行数据密集型计算。为此，将开发和部署基础设施，以便能够分析从应用程序输出、遥感和仪器得出的数据以及广泛分散的特定学科数据库中收集的大量数据。三个技术领域是创建元计算环境的核心，最初将成为NPACI的基础：可适应的、可扩展的工具/环境;数据密集型计算;交互环境。还选择了几个科学应用程序，以激励，指导和验证NPACI基础设施的开发和集成。分子科学，神经科学，地球系统科学和工程将首先集中在科学发现和技术发展成熟的领域。NPACI将把计算科学和工程教育活动纳入基础设施，建立在合作伙伴关系内成功的教育和外联工作的基础上。将特别强调与代表性不足的少数民族、妇女和新社区的外联。 该伙伴关系将侧重于提供先进的硬件、赋能技术、应用技术方面的前沿工作、教育、培训和外联。包括在这个奖项是第一次增加支付给加州大学圣地亚哥分校及其合作伙伴为FY 98，其中包括一般业务费用，包括设备。

This action executes a cooperative agreement between NSF and the National Partnership for Advanced Computational Infrastructure (NPACI) at the University of California - San Diego (UCSD), under the direction of Dr. Sid Karin via NSF award ASC 9619020. The cooperative agreement will be operational for a period of five years and is the result of a proposal submitted to NSF solicitation, "Partnerships for Advanced Computational Infrastructure" (PACI), NSF 96-31. The PACI program builds on and replaces the NSF Supercomputer Centers Program established in 1985 The program focuses on newly emerging opportunities in high performance computing and communications, providing flexibility, both to adapt to rapidly evolving circumstances and to meet the need for high-end computation, in order to enable continued U.S. world leadership in computational science and engineering. NSF, through this program, will provide access for researchers to high performance computing systems, with associated highly trained staff and researchers necessary to develop and optimize their use. The emergence of scalable parallel systems, high performance networking and high bandwidth and large capacity mass storage systems creates the opportunity for a national infrastructure consisting of a number of geographically distributed sites strongly coupled to high end computational resources and to each other via high speed communications networks. NPACI will lead the deployment and evolution of a national-scale metacomputing environment that will benefit the national user community in all fields of computational science and engineering. This infrastructure will integrate compute and data servers, and employ the talents of computer and computational scientists to guide its evolution. It will leverage the activities of many projects. The metacomputing environment will be extended to enable not only numerically intensive but also data-intensive computing. To that end, infrastructure will be developed and deployed to enable analysis of extremely large data collections from application output, remote-sensing and instrumentation-derived data, and data in widely scattered, discipline-specific databases. Three technology areas which are central to creating a metacomputing environment will initially be the basis for NPACI: Adaptable, Scalable Tools/Environments; Data-intensive Computing; and Interaction Environments. Several scientific applications have also been chosen that will motivate, guide, and validate development and integration of the NPACI infrastructure. Molecular Science, Neuroscience, Earth Systems Science, and Engineering will initially be focused on as areas ripe for scientific discovery and technology development. NPACI will integrate computational science and engineering education activities into the infrastructure, building on successful education and outreach efforts within the partnership. Particular emphasis will be placed on outreach to underrepresented minorities, women, and new communities. The Partnership will concentrate on providing advanced hardware, enabling technology, leading edge work in application technology, education, training and outreach. Included in this award is the first incremental payment to UCSD and its partners for FY98 which covers general operating expenses including equipment.