BERLIN, Germany, March 24, 2017 — The Gauss Centre for Supercomputing (GCS) extends its role as a hosting member of the Partnership of Advanced Computing Europe (PRACE) into the European programme’s 2nd phase, PRACE 2, which will run from 2017 to 2020. At the 25th PRACE council meeting held in Amsterdam (The Netherlands), it was agreed that the petascale high performance computing (HPC) systems of the GCS members HLRS (High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart), JSC (Jülich Supercomputing Centre), and LRZ (Leibniz Supercomputing Centre Garching/Munich) will continue to be available for European research activities of outstanding scientific excellence and value. By extending its partnership as PRACE 2 hosting member, GCS will again take a leading role in HPC in Europe and will significantly contribute to boost scientific and industrial advancement by offering principal investigators access to GCS’s world-class HPC infrastructure to be used for approved large-scale research activities.

With providing computing time on their three petascale HPC systems Hazel Hen hosted at HLRS, JUQUEEN hosted at JSC, and SuperMUC hosted at LRZ, the Gauss Centre for Supercomputing is the PRACE 2 hosting member that provides the lion’s share of computing resources for the European HPC programme. Together with the other four hosting members (BSC representing Spain, CINECA representing Italy, CSCS representing Switzerland, and GENCI representing France), the PRACE programme provides a federated world-class Tier-0 supercomputing infrastructure that is architecturally diverse and allows for capability allocations that are competitive with comparable programmes in the USA and in Asia. The offering of core hours capacity for European research projects through PRACE 2 is planned to grow to 75 million node hours per year.

Eligible to apply for computing time for large-scale simulation projects on the supercomputers through the PRACE 2 programme are investigators from academia and industry residing in one of the 24 PRACE member countries. Resource allocations will be granted based on a single, thorough peer review process which is exclusively based on scientific excellence of the highest standard. The principal investigators of accepted research projects will be able to use computing resources of the highest level for a predefined period of time. Additionally, they will be supported by coordinated high-level support teams of the supercomputing centres providing access to their world-class HPC infrastructure.

The continuation of the European HPC programme with the 2nd phase of their partnership, PRACE 2, was resolved at the 25th PRACE Council Meeting in Amsterdam in early March, 2017. The overarching goal of PRACE is to provide the federated European supercomputing infrastructure that is science-driven and globally competitive. It builds on the strengths of European science providing high-end computing and data analysis resources to drive discoveries and new developments in all areas of science and industry, from fundamental research to applied sciences including: mathematics and computer sciences, medicine, and engineering, as well as digital humanities and social sciences.

Further information: http://www.prace-ri.eu/IMG/pdf/2017-03-20-PRACE-2-Press-Release-V11.pdf

About GCS

The Gauss Centre for Supercomputing (GCS) combines the three national supercomputing centres HLRS (High Performance Computing Center Stuttgart), JSC (Jülich Supercomputing Centre), and LRZ (Leibniz Supercomputing Centre, Garching near Munich) into Germany’s Tier-0 supercomputing institution. Concertedly, the three centres provide the largest and most powerful supercomputing infrastructure in all of Europe to serve a wide range of industrial and research activities in various disciplines. They also provide top-class training and education for the national as well as the European High Performance Computing (HPC) community. GCS is the German member of PRACE (Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe), an international non-profit association consisting of 25 member countries, whose representative organizations create a pan-European supercomputing infrastructure, providing access to computing and data management resources and services for large-scale scientific and engineering applications at the highest performance level. GCS is jointly funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the federal states of Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, and North Rhine-Westphalia. It has its headquarters in Berlin/Germany. www.gauss-centre.eu

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Source: GCS