Bird of a Feather Description
The context: Exascale computing can process larger quantities of data faster than ever before and the technologies being developed for exascale can help accelerate innovation across all sectors of the economy. Quantum-classical hybrid solutions already go beyond research environments into the business spheres. The first generation exascale computing projects in the USA and UK are soon ending.
The questions: Which software tools and environments are emerging as the most sought-after? How ready are we to answer the skills needs of computational researchers and business users of these platforms? Do we have a clear competence framework to inform employers, what are the needed skillsets to harness the promise and potential of emerging technologies?
The goal of the organisers is to trigger discussion on competence framework based on the emerging software tools and environments and the assessment of the user readiness for adoption. We want to ensure that the several existing initiatives to create competence frameworks in HPC, Data and AI do not stay completely separate and take into account the emerging exascale and quantum-classical hybrid skills requirements. The intended audience is academics, researchers, vendors, and educators engaged in the theoretical development, innovation and application of the areas mentioned above. The format: Initial lightning talks by the panellists will build the basis of the discussion in which we will draw the audience with real-live polling tools. The participants will join our panel of specialists to review the state-of-the-art, discuss the way forward and pose their specific questions.
Registration Details
To register for the Supercomputing Conference 2023 and attend our Bird of a Feather, follow the instructions on the SC23 webpage. Standard registration deadline: 13 October 2023.
The Organising Committee
Evguenia S. Alexandrova, PhD – Evguenia is the Hartree Centre Training Manager, STFC. She has over 20 years of experience in the field. She was a Professional Training Coordinator at BSC, Barcelona(2011- 16), and the PATC coordinator at BSC in PRACE IPs 1-5. 2000 – 2011, she was a PGStudies Coordinator at the School of Systems Engineering and ACET Centre at the University of Reading. Her research is in collaborative learning in technology-rich environments and implementing computational science research methods and HPC tools in education and training. She holds a PhD from the University of Reading, Pedagogical Models and ManagementFactors for Creating Successful Courses at the Postgraduate Level in an Interactive Collaborative Learning Environment. She co-edited and co-authored the book Technological Advances in Interactive Collaborative Learning (ISBN: 978-1-4665-0208-6) and 30 research papers in journals and peer-reviewed conference proceedings. She is co-chairing workshops at several international conferences.
Erik Draeger, PhD – Erik is the Director of the High-Performance Computing Innovation Center and RADIUSS project at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory as well as the scientific computing group leader at the Center for Applied Scientific Computing. He is also the Deputy Director of Application Development for the Exascale Computing Project, jointly overseeing a portfolio of 22 Office of Science applications, 4 NNSA applications, and 7 co-design projects. Erik earned a Bachelor’s degree in Physics from the University of California, Berkeley in 1995 and received a PhD in theoretical condensed matter physics from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, in 2001.
Mike Heroux, PhD – Mike is a Senior Scientist at Sandia National Laboratories, Director of software technology for the US DOE Exascale Computing Project (ECP) and Scientist in Residence at St. John’s University, MN. His research interests include all aspects of scalable scientific and engineering software for new and emerging parallel computing architectures. He is the founder of the Trilinos scientific libraries, Kokkos performance portability, Mantevo mini apps and HPCGBenchmark projects, and is presently leading the Extreme-scale Scientific Software Stack (E4S)project in DOE, a curated collection of HPC software targeting leadership platforms. Mike is involved in software productivity and sustainability improvement efforts for DOE and NSF, and reproducibility initiatives for scientific publications with ACM and IEEE. He leads the IDEAS project, dedicated to engaging scientific software teams to identify and adopt practices that improve productivity and sustainability.
Laura Shultz, PhD – Laura is the Acting Head of the Department of Quantum Computing and Technologies at the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre (LRZ). At LRZ, Laura has driven forward several initiatives in the realm of supercomputing – including future computing, AI and quantum as well as building large-scale global partnerships – in her role for strategic development and partnerships. She received her Diplom from Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich in 2005. Before joining LRZ, she worked in the Computation Directorate at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), as well as in a leading role in LLNL’s High-Performance Computing Innovation Center (HPCIC)aimed at connecting industry with novel technologies in HPC and beyond. Laura is the lead author of LRZ’s Strategic Plan for Quantum Computing and co-founded the monthly Bavarian Quantum Computing eXchange (BQCX). Ms. Schulz has served on conference and workshop program committees, including SC and ISC, and created the yearly forward-looking NextGen HPC event series.
Ann Backhaus – Ann is the Education & Training Manager, Pawsey, with 25 years of experience in training and talent development in private industry and academia. As a Global Training and Talent Development Leader, Ann’s interest lies in adult learning – the ongoing personal and professional development of individuals and organisations. She has led distributed teams, creating such materials as e-learning assets, webinars, demos, web and wiki sites, digital classrooms, and a variety of enablement materials. Her experience spans numerous industries, including education, technology, software, business and finance, non-profit, and medicine. She holds Graduate Certificate, Teaching and Learning in Higher Education from Deakin University, Bachelor’s degree from Carroll University and Master’s degree from School for New Learning, from DePaul University.
Further information
For more information, please email Evguenia S. Alexandrova: evguenia.alexandrova@stfc.ac.uk