Nov. 15, 2021  — Science performed with the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center’s (PSC’s) advanced research computers has been recognized with two HPCwire Readers’ and Editors’ Choice Awards, presented at the 2021 International Conference for High Performance Computing, Networking, Storage and Analysis (SC21), in St. Louis, Missouri. Recognized by an Editors’ Choice Award, scientists working for the state of Louisiana used PSC’s Bridges and Bridges-2 to simulate the impact of storms on the state’s coastal regions. The other, Readers’ Choice Award, cited an international team that used Bridges-2, among other systems, in an artificial-intelligence approach toward rapid classification of mysterious collections of stars called compact clusters.

“Our team is very proud to support the amazing and impactful accomplishments that led to these awards,” said Shawn Brown, director of PSC. It is the twelfth year PSC has been so recognized.

The list of winners was revealed at the HPCwire booth at the event, and on the HPCwire website, located at www.HPCwire.com. PSC was recognized with:

Editors’ Choice: Best Use of HPC in Response to Societal Plights: Working for the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, a team of government, industry and academic scientists used PSC’s now-retired Bridges and its current flagship system Bridges-2 to create simulations of storm effects on the Louisiana coast, launching a series of simulations that will underlie the state’s upcoming 2023 Coastal Master Plan. State decision makers will use the results of these simulations to assess cost versus benefit for risk reduction and restoration projects, minimizing the effects of coastal storms on both humans and the environment with the most economic use of taxpayer dollars.

Readers’ Choice: Best Use of HPC in Physical Sciences: An international scientific collaboration developed the first class of artificial-intelligence models that outperforms humans in the classification of thousands of compact star clusters observed by the Hubble Space Telescope. The work, which employed Bridges-2 among other systems, will greatly accelerate astronomers’ ability to analyze and understand these mysterious collections of stars and how they formed, shedding light on the evolution of galaxies and the Universe.

The coveted annual HPCwire Readers’ and Editors’ Choice Awards are determined through a nomination and voting process with the global HPCwire community, as well as selections from the HPCwire editors. The awards are an annual feature of the publication and constitute prestigious recognition from the HPC community and are revealed each year to kick off the annual supercomputing conference, which showcases high performance computing, networking, storage and data analysis.

“Every year it is our pleasure to connect with and honor the HPC community through our Readers’ and Editors’ Choice Awards, and 2021 marked an exceptional showing of industry innovation,” said Tom Tabor, CEO of Tabor Communications, publisher of HPCwire. “Between our worldwide readership of HPC experts and an unparalleled panel of editors, the Readers’ and Editors’ Choice Awards represent resounding recognition throughout the industry. Our congratulations go out to all of the winners.”
More information on these awards can be found at the HPCwire website (www.HPCwire.com) or on Twitter through the following hashtag: #HPCwireAwards.

About HPCwire: HPCwire is the #1 news and information resource covering the fastest computers in the world and the people who run them. With a legacy dating back to 1986, HPCwire has enjoyed a legacy of world-class editorial and journalism, making it the news source of choice selected by science, technology and business professionals interested in high performance and data-intensive computing. Visit HPCwire at www.HPCwire.com.

About PSC: The Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center (PSC) is a joint computational research center with Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh. PSC provides university, government and industrial researchers with access to several of the most powerful systems for high-performance computing, communications and data storage available to scientists and engineers nationwide for unclassified research. PSC advances the state of the art in high-performance computing, communications and data analytics and offers a flexible environment for solving the largest and most challenging problems in research. See www.PSC.edu.

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Source: The Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center