Transformative Petascale Particle-In-Cell Simulations

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This project will use Blue Waters to enable transformative simulations that will answer several compelling science questions in plasma physics. These questions include: 1. Can laser plasma instabilities be controlled or even harnessed in inertial fusion plasmas? 2. What are the collective processes responsible for the formation of shocks in collisionless plasmas, 3.Can plasma-based acceleration be the basis of new compact accelerators for use at the energy frontier, in medicine, in probing materials, and in novel light sources?The project will use a suite of fully kinetic plasma simulation tools developed by the team to answer these questions. In particular, the plasma simulation tools are based on particle-in-cell (PIC) methods which have been successful in exploring a wide range of frontier topics. Four distinct parallel PIC codes, with varying degrees of physics approximations, will be used in the project. All the codes are highly optimized on a single processor and have very high parallel efficiency.In terms of the broader impact of the project, the PIC codes developed by the project could potentially be used to make scientific discoveries that impact diverse fields beyond the current investigation with significant societal impact such as high-energy physics, fusion energy, and reliability of communication satellites. Additionally, the programming abstractions developed for porting scientific codes to future massively parallel architectures will impact many others areas of scientific computing and identifying these abstractions are the first steps for possibly automating the process. Finally, the proposed research will synergize with the new NSF funded Particle-in-Cell and Kinetic Simulation Software Center (PICKSC) at UCLA and the Institute for Digital Research and Education (IDRE). This will allow results to broadly impact research and education within the plasma particle-in-cell community and the computational science community at UCLA. The PI is currently the director of both PICKSC and IDRE.