Automotive Supercomputing Pioneer Myron Ginsberg Dies at 71

By Tiffany Trader

April 14, 2015

The staff at HPCwire sends its deepest condolences to the family and friends of Myron Ginsberg, who died on April 10, 2015, at the age of 71.

A long-time researcher and independent consultant in the field of high-performance computing, Dr. Myron Ginsberg was credited with the first in-house installation of a supercomputer in the auto industry during his years as a staff research scientist at General Motors Research. After GM, Dr. Ginsberg became a consultant systems engineer within the high-performance computing group of EDS.

Myron Ginsberg

The bulk of Dr. Ginsberg’s 30-year career was dedicated to improving hardware and software performance for large-scale scientific and engineering applications. Research efforts included the development of benchmarking techniques for assessing the performance limitations of parallel computing systems for industrial applications. While he is best known for his contributions to private industry, Dr. Ginsberg’s curriculum vitae also extended to government research labs (NASA Electronics Research Center, NASA Langley Research Center, U.S. Army Research Laboratory), and academia (University of Iowa, Southern Methodist University, University of Michigan).

For his work on the first automotive supercomputer, Dr. Ginsberg was recognized by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) which honored him as an ACM Fellow for his “Pioneering and Sustained Contributions to Supercomputing Research and Its Application to the Automotive Industry in addition to Distinguished Teaching and Service in High-Performance Computing.” He would also become a senior member of the IEEE and was elevated to IEEE Fellow in 2009.

He had close ties to SAE International (originally known as the Society of Automotive Engineers), and edited four SAE volumes on automotive supercomputer applications. He also received the SAE Distinguished Speaker Award, the SAE Forest R. McFarland Award in recognition of his outstanding service in the automotive supercomputing field, and was a three-time recipient of the SAE Excellence in Oral Presentation Award.

Dr. Ginsberg served as a national distinguished lecturer for ACM, IEEE, SIAM, ASME, SAE and Sigma Xi. He published extensively and was an invited speaker at numerous national and international events and gave presentations at the Center for Parallel Computers at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, Los Alamos National Lab, Lawrence Livermore National Lab, Oak Ridge National Lab, General Motors, EDS, DaimlerChrysler, University of Michigan, University of Illinois, and University of Laval, among others.

One of Dr. Ginsberg’s most treasured honors was being named IEEE Fellow. The prestigious recognition is bestowed on members who have achieved an extraordinary record of accomplishment in an IEEE field of interest.

Here’s an excerpt from the IEEE’s announcement:

THE REBEL OF GM Myron Ginsberg, currently a consultant in high-performance computing, was an evangelist for bringing supercomputing to General Motors Research in Detroit in the 1980s. His effort earned him the title of “rebel in residence.” He was elevated to Fellow by IEEE in the application engineer/practitioner category for “application of supercomputers in the automotive industry.” The distinction of Fellow in this category is conferred on a person “responsible for product development, advancement in system, application or operation, project management or construction activity, process development, manufacturing innovation, codes or standards development, or other application of technology.”

After GM became the first U.S. auto company to buy a supercomputer in 1983, the time it took to go from concept to production on a new vehicle dropped from five years to 18 months. Everything that has become standard in 21st century automotive engineering – being able to study environmental conditions, acoustics and vibration, and safety variables on a computer – these are all things that Dr. Ginsberg was innovating. Virtual prototyping, using math-based modeling to run computer simulations, meant that GM engineers could reduce their reliance on very expensive physical crash-testing procedures. Beyond just being a physical test substitute, computational modeling allowed engineers to ask “what if” questions that wouldn’t be feasible with costly and time-consuming physical testing.

After his successful tenure at GM, Dr. Ginsberg went on to teach HPC courses to industry groups and college students. “I wanted to make it as easy as possible for supercomputer users to get as much performance as possible out of their high-performance machines even if they had no background in EE or computer science,” he shared in the IEEE piece.

Myron Ginsberg is survived by his beloved wife Judy Ginsberg, daughter Ellen (Bryan) Hochberg and granddaughters Andrea Rose Hochberg and Marissa Carley Hochberg. He is also remembered by many loving nieces, nephews, other family members and friends. Those wishing to send their condolences to the family can do so here.

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