Transient finite element computations on 65536 processors: The connection machine
Transient finite element computations on 65536 processors: The connection machine
复制标题
65536 处理器上的瞬态有限元计算：连接机
DOI：
10.1002/nme.1620300104
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发表时间：
1990
影响因子：
2.9
通讯作者：
K. Park
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
C. Farhat;N. Sobh;K. Park
本文报告了我们在连接机上解决大规模有限元瞬态问题的经验。我们首先概述这种大规模并行处理器，并强调与有限元计算最相关的功能。其中包括虚拟处理器、并行磁盘 I/O 和并行科学可视化功能。我们介绍了一种分布式数据结构，并讨论了将数千个处理器映射到离散结构上的策略。并行数据结构与虚拟处理器映射算法的结合在高效实现不规则和混合二维和三维有限元网格的大规模并行显式计算方面发挥着关键作用。用 C*/Paris 编写的有限元内核已成功运行，解决了大型问题规模的线性和非线性动态模拟的多个示例。从这些示例运行中，我们已经能够详细评估它们在连接机器上的性能。我们表明，网格不规则性会导致 MIMD（多指令多数据）编程风格，从而对 SIMD（单指令多数据）机器的性能产生负面影响。最后，我们解决了一些重要的理论和实现问题，这些问题将实质性地扩大有限元计算在这个高度并行处理器上的应用范围。
This paper reports on our experience in solving large-scale finite element transient problems on the Connection Machine. We begin with an overview of this massively parallel processor and emphasize the features which are most relevant to finite element computations. These include virtual processors, parallel disk I/O and parallel scientific visualization capabilities. We introduce a distributed data structure and discuss a strategy for mapping thousands of processors onto a discretized structure. The combination of the parallel data structure with the virtual processor mapping algorithm is shown to play a pivotal role in efficiently achieving massively parallel explicit computations on irregular and hybrid two- and three-dimensional finite element meshes. The finite element kernels written in C*/Paris have run with success to solve several examples of linear and non-linear dynamic simulations of large problem sizes. From these example runs, we have been able to assess in detail their performance on the Connection Machine. We show that mesh irregularities induce an MIMD (Multiple Instruction Multiple Data) style of programming which impacts negatively the performance of this SIMD (Single Instruction Multiple Data) machine. Finally, we address some important theoretical and implementational issues that will materially advance the application ranges of finite element computations on this highly parallel processor.