Simulation Tools
Toward a new model of the cell
December 17, 2012 9:58 am | News | Comments
Researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and colleagues have proposed a new method that creates an ontology, or a specification of all the major players in the cell and the relationships between them. This computational model of the cell is made from large networks of gene and protein interactions, and is created automatically from large datasets, helping researchers see potentially new biological components.
Team achieves petaflop-level earthquake simulations
April 3, 2013 9:29 am | News | Comments
A team of researchers at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) and the University...
Blue Waters open for research
April 2, 2013 1:09 pm | News | Comments
One of the most powerful supercomputers in the world, was recently declared available...
Simulations uncover obstacle to harnessing laser-driven fusion
March 27, 2013 7:50 am | News | Comments
A once-promising approach for using next-generation, ultra-intense lasers to help...
Nano-breakthrough: Solving the case of the herringbone crystal
May 13, 2013 7:54 am | News | CommentsLeading nanoscientists created beautiful, tiled patterns with flat nanocrystals, but they were left with a mystery: Why did some sets of crystals arrange themselves in an alternating, herringbone style? To find out, they turned to experts in computer simulation at the University of Michigan and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Computer scientists suggest new spin on origins of evolvability
April 29, 2013 8:53 am | News | CommentsScientists have long observed that species seem to have become increasingly capable of evolving in response to changes in the environment. But computer science researchers now say that the popular explanation of competition to survive in nature may not actually be necessary for evolvability to increase.
Scientists discover new materials to capture methane
April 16, 2013 12:52 pm | News | CommentsScientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the University of California, Berkeley have discovered new materials to capture methane, the second highest concentration greenhouse gas emitted into the atmosphere. The research team performed systematic computer simulation studies on the effectiveness of methane capture using two different materials—liquid solvents and nanoporous zeolites.
Computer models show how deep carbon could return to Earth's surface
March 21, 2013 9:17 am | News | CommentsComputer simulations of water under extreme pressure are helping geochemists understand how carbon might be recycled from hundreds of miles below the Earth's surface. Carbon compounds are the basis of life, provide most of our fuels and contribute to climate change. The cycling of carbon through the oceans, atmosphere, and shallow crust of the Earth has been intensively studied, but little is known about what happens to carbon deep in the Earth.
Mechdyne licenses CAVE2 from University of Illinois at Chicago
March 12, 2013 9:27 am | News | CommentsMechdyne Corporation has recently announced that it has licensed the CAVE2 hybrid reality environment developed by the Electronic Visualization Laboratory at University of Illinois at Chicago. The licensing agreement was signed in January of 2013, and continues the strong working relationship that began in 1994 when Mechdyne licensed the EVL-designed original CAVE technology.
An atlas of the human heart is drawn using statistics
February 26, 2013 10:17 am | News | CommentsResearchers at Pompeu Fabra University (Spain) have created a high resolution atlas of the heart with 3D images taken from 138 people. The study demonstrates that an average image of an organ along with its variations can be obtained for the purposes of comparing individual cases and differentiating healthy forms from pathologies.
Supercomputers journey to limits of spacetime
February 21, 2013 1:19 pm | News | CommentsResearchers have used the 3D simulation capabilities of the supercomputers at the Texas Advanced Computing Center to predict the formation of accretion disks and relativistic jets that warp and bend more than previously thought, shaped both by the extreme gravity of the black hole and by powerful magnetic forces generated by its spin. Their highly detailed models of the black hole environment contribute new knowledge to the field.
Future science: Using 3D worlds to visualize data
February 20, 2013 4:29 am | by CARLA K. JOHNSON - AP Medical Writer - Associated Press | News | CommentsTake a walk through a human brain? Fly over the surface of Mars? Computer scientists at the University of Illinois at Chicago are pushing science fiction closer to reality with a wraparound virtual world where a researcher wearing 3D glasses can do all that and more. In the system, known as CAVE2, a 8-foot-high screen encircles the viewer 320 degrees. A panorama of images springs from 72 stereoscopic liquid crystal display panels, conveying a dizzying sense of being able to touch what's not really there.
New initiative to improve lithium-ion batteries
February 12, 2013 10:23 am | News | CommentsA Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory team is working to improve lithium-ion battery performance, lifetime, and safety. Working with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the scientists are developing a new methodology for performing first-principles quantum molecular dynamics simulations at an unprecedented scale to understand key aspects of the chemistry and dynamics in lithium-ion batteries, particularly at interfaces.
New modeling approach transforms imaging technologies
February 5, 2013 12:09 pm | by Emil Venere, Purdue University | News | CommentsResearchers are improving the performance of technologies ranging from medical computed tomography scanners to digital cameras using a system of models to extract specific information from huge collections of data and then reconstructing images like a jigsaw puzzle. The new approach is called model-based iterative reconstruction, or MBIR, and it is helping to greatly reduce the noise in data, providing great clarity at lower radiation intensities.
Winners of annual NSF visualization competition announced
February 1, 2013 12:03 pm | News | CommentsThe National Science Foundation (NSF), along with the journal Science, this week announced the 53 winners and honorable mentions of the International Science & Technology Visualization Challenge, a contest jointly sponsored by NSF and the joournal Science. The winning entries highlight the often stunning capabilities of computer-aided visualization techniques.
Simulating more efficient solar cells
January 28, 2013 1:50 pm | News | CommentsUsing an exotic form of silicon could substantially improve the efficiency of solar cells, according to computer simulations by researchers at the University of California, Davis and in Hungary. Solar cells are based on the photoelectric effect: A photon, or particle of light, hits a silicon crystal and generates a negatively charged electron and a positively charged hole. Collecting those electron-hole pairs generates electric current. Conventional solar cells generate one electron-hole pair per incoming photon, and have a theoretical maximum efficiency of 33%. One exciting new route to improved efficiency is to generate more than one electron-hole pair per photon.
Researchers break million-core supercomputer barrier
January 28, 2013 10:18 am | by Andrew Myers, Stanford University | News | CommentsStanford Engineering's Center for Turbulence Research has set a new record in computational science by successfully using a supercomputer with more than one million computing cores to solve a complex fluid dynamics problem—the prediction of noise generated by a supersonic jet engine.
“Quadruple helix” DNA structure proven to exist in human cells
January 21, 2013 8:53 am | News | CommentsMarking the culmination of over 10 years of investigation by scientists to show—in vivo—that complex four-stranded structures exist in the human genome alongside Watson and Crick’s famous double helix, researchers in the U.K. have recently published a paper that goes on to show clear links between concentrations of four-stranded quadruplexes and the process of DNA replication, which is pivotal to cell division and production.
Study reveals extraordinary glass properties
January 7, 2013 7:41 am | News | CommentsArmed with a better understanding of how glasses age and evolve, researchers at the University of Chicago and the University of Wisconsin-Madison raise the possibility of designing a new class of materials at the molecular level via a vapor-deposition process.
How computers push on the molecules they simulate
January 3, 2013 10:15 am | News | CommentsComputer simulations are essential to test theories and explore what's inaccessible to direct experiment. Digital computers can't use exact, continuous equations of motion and have to slice time into chunks, so persistent errors are introduced in the form of "shadow work" that distorts the result. Scientists have learned to separate the physically realistic aspects of the simulation from the artifacts of the computer method.
Physicists take photonic topological insulators to the next level
December 26, 2012 8:13 am | News | CommentsResearchers at The University of Texas at Austin have designed a simulation that, for the first time, emulates key properties of electronic topological insulators. Their simulation is part of a rapidly moving scientific race to understand and exploit the potential of topological insulators, which are a state of matter that was only discovered in the past decade.
Study offers insight into converting wood to bio-oil
December 14, 2012 8:15 am | News | CommentsNew research from North Carolina State University provides molecular-level insights into how cellulose breaks down in wood to create "bio-oils" which can be refined into any number of useful products. Using a supercomputer, the team calculated what's occurring at the molecular level when wood is rapidly heated to high temperature in the absence of oxygen, a decomposition process known as pyrolysis.
Virtual reality system is key to medical discovery
December 11, 2012 12:31 pm | News | CommentsBecause of the limited image spatial-resolution of even today's best-quality laptop and desktop computers, researchers and physicians often can’t see phenomena that are too large, too small, too complex, or too distant. CAVE2, a next-generation, large-scale virtual environment, combines the benefits of scalable-resolution display walls with virtual-reality system to create a revealing and seamless 2D and 3D environment that is becoming increasingly important in scientific discovery.
A human-caused climate change signal emerges from the noise
November 30, 2012 7:40 am | News | CommentsBy comparing simulations from 20 different computer models to satellite observations, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory climate scientists and colleagues from 16 other organizations have found that tropospheric and stratospheric temperature changes are clearly related to human activities.
Deciphering bacterial doomsday decisions
November 26, 2012 11:28 am | News | CommentsLike a homeowner prepping for a hurricane, the bacterium Bacillus subtilis uses a long checklist to prepare for survival in hard times. In a new study, scientists at Rice University and the University of Houston uncovered an elaborate mechanism that allows B. subtilis to begin preparing for survival, even as it delays the ultimate decision of whether to "hunker down" and withdraw into a hardened spore.
Modeling the breaking points of metallic glasses
November 26, 2012 7:44 am | News | CommentsMetallic glass alloys (or liquid metals) are three times stronger than the best industrial steel, but can be molded into complex shapes with the same ease as plastic. These materials are highly resistant to scratching, denting, shattering, and corrosion. Mathematical methods developed by a Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory scientists will help explain why liquid metals have wildly different breaking points.
Study reveals clues to cause of hydrogen embrittlement
November 19, 2012 1:39 pm | News | CommentsSince the phenomenon was discovered in 1875, hydrogen embrittlement has been a persistent problem for the design of structural materials. Despite decades of research, experts have yet to fully understand the physics underlying the problem and must still resort to a trial-and-error approach. Now, a team of researchers have shown that the answer may be rooted in how hydrogen modifies material behaviors at the nanoscale.
Scientists simulate Earth's creation to solve core problem
November 19, 2012 8:33 am | News | CommentsUsing computer simulations, researchers from the University of California, Davis and the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing have helped to solve a mystery that scientists have puzzled over since the early 1950s: What accounts for Earth's core density?
Supercomputer simulations studied to improve helmets
November 14, 2012 1:36 pm | News | CommentsResearchers at Sandia National Laboratories and the University of New Mexico are comparing supercomputer simulations of blast waves on the brain with clinical studies of veterans suffering from mild traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) to help improve helmet designs.
