SOFTWARE SIMULATIONS
Models for Scientific Discovery

ORNL has had significant influence worldwide on the software and algorithms used for scientific discovery. In the late 1980s, Parallel Virtual Machine (PVM) software was developed at ORNL. PVM, which had more than 400,000 users in the mid-1990s, became a worldwide de facto standard for clustering computers into a virtual supercomputer.

In the mid-1990s, the Message Passing Interface (MPI) effort was begun by Jack Dongarra, who has joint appointments at ORNL and the University of Tennessee. MPI is the dominant programming paradigm used by scientific codes around the world. Dongarra also led the development of LAPACK and BLAS to solve linear algebra problems by high-performance computers. LAPACK and its parallel version ScaLAPACK are now used on all super-computers around the world.

In the late 1990s ORNL, other national labs, and IBM developed an award-winning, ultrafast data storage system, known as the High Performance Storage System, which is used today on supercomputers across the nation. At the same time, ORNL researchers developed electronic notebook software that allows large scientific research teams to collaborate more efficiently. This software now has thousands of users in research, industry, medicine, and academia.

In 2002 a national software effort led by ORNL called OSCAR (Open Source Cluster Application Resources) became the most used cluster-computing management software in the world. It has 50,000 users.

With the help of software and simulation codes partly developed at ORNL, Laboratory researchers have used supercomputers for three-dimensional modeling of fusion plasmas and exploding stars; finding genes and predicting future climate as industrial emissions change; and simulating car crashes to aid the design of lighter, more efficient cars that better protect car-crash victims. ORNL's computer modeling of giant magnetoresistance already has influenced Seagate and IBM, leading to faster desktop computers and smaller, smarter digital cameras.

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