Acquisition of a High Performance Computer for Solid Earth Geophysicis at Caltech

9910387 Gurnis这笔赠款为加州理工大学地震实验室为基础固体地球地球物理研究购买并行处理计算服务器的费用提供部分支持。具体的计算机和配置将在对2000年上半年上市的最先进的科学计算机进行大量研究后确定。这款机器可能会与十(10)个处理器的SGI Origin 2000相提并论，它具有八(8)GB的主内存和R12000处理器。这台机器将被一大群教师(包括但不限于M.Gurny、R.Clayton、D.Helmberger和M.Simons)、博士后学者和研究生使用，他们积极从事处理海量数据集、模拟物理过程和开发新的计算算法。研究将跨越地震学、地球动力学和大地测量学。这些地球物理领域的研究正在与部门规模的并行处理计算服务器的性能进步迅速同步推进。该设施允许的一些典型计算项目将包括处理干涉雷达数据以观察地壳形变，对地震后缓慢的地壳蠕变和强烈的地面震动进行建模，处理海洋巡航的地震反射数据，处理整个地球的全球层析图像，以及对球壳内的热对流进行建模。

9910387GurnisThis grant provides partial support of the costs of acquiring a parallel processing compute server for basic solid Earth geophysical research within Caltech's Seismological Laboratory. The exact computer and configuration will be determined after considerable study of state-of-the-art scientific computers which are on the market during the first half of calendar year 2000. The machine will probably be comparable to a ten (10) processor SGI Origin 2000 with eight (8) Gigabytes of main memory with R12000 processors. The machine will be used by a large group of faculty (including, but not limited to, Professors M. Gurnis, R. Clayton, D. Helmberger, and M. Simons), postdoctoral scholars, and graduate students actively engaged in processing massive data sets, modeling physical processes, and developing new computational algorithms. Research will span seismology, geodynamics, and geodesy. Studies within these areas of geophysics are rapidly advancing in step with advances in the performance of departmental-scale, parallel-processing compute servers. Some typical computational projects which will be allowed by this facility will include processing interferometric radar data to observe crustal deformation, modeling slow crustal creep and intense ground shaking following earthquakes, processing seismic reflection data from oceanographic cruises, processing global tomographic images of the whole Earth, and modeling thermal convection within a spherical shell.***