The National Partnership for Advanced Computational Infrastructure (NPACI)
project is similar to the NCSA PACI in that it is expected to have a life
cycle of approximately ten years. Also like NCSA, participation will be
beneficial to leveraging additional research projects in the future.
In this project, Rice University will be a partner of San Diego Supercomputer
Center with participation taking two forms. First, in the area of scalable
input/output, the goal is to develop software systems to optimize programs
so they perform large-scale I/O much more efficiently. Ken Kennedy has
developed preliminary techniques to automate some of the restructuring
needed to accomplish this task. This research has led to the development
of a prototype compiler system. Under the partnership Rice will further
develop the prototype compiler and runtime system so that it will be suitable
for evaluation of the software with real applications. In the longer term,
HiPerSoft plans to transfer this technology to compiler vendors for incorporation
into commercial products through Rice's industrial partners programs.
In the area of minority education, Richard Tapia will work with the NPACI
and NCSA programs to establish nationally scaled efforts to increase the
number of women and minorities in the engineering and computational sciences.