Use of the Supercomputer
Changes in the environment caused by human activities may lead to exceeding the Earth’s resilience capability, resulting in irreversible climatic and environmental changes. To prevent this to happen, it is necessary to make future projections and to take appropriate countermeasures.
The Earth system that surrounds us, including the atmosphere, oceans, and rivers, is based on complex physical, chemical, and biological processes. We need to reproduce a virtual earth environment using computers incorporating the latest knowledge of these various processes, examine climatic and environmental changes, and make detailed temporal and spatial projections.
In order to support research on global environmental model calculations, the Center for Global Environmental Research (CGER) in cooperation with the Environmental Information Department at NIES has established a supercomputer system and offers it to researchers both within and outside NIES.
Specification of the Supercomputer
The supercomputer (vector processor) was installed to elucidate and project phenomena related to global environmental change. The first supercomputer was introduced in fiscal year 1991 and it was updated to its seventh version in March 2020.
The core of the current supercomputer system is an ultra-high-speed 256 VE (Vector Engine) vector processor (NEC SX-Aurora TSUBASA A511-64, peak performance: 622.8 TFLOPS). The vector processor has an ultra-high-speed vector calculator and a large-capacity memory necessary for large-scale calculations such as global environmental simulations. In addition, a scalar processor (HPE Apollo 2000, peak performance: 86.0 TFLOPS) and a large-capacity file system with an effective capacity of 22 PB have been introduced to meet various calculation needs and the need for storing a huge amount of calculation data. These systems are available via an internal network connecting the various research centers.
| Number of Nodes | 256 VE nodes |
|---|---|
| Total Number of CPU Cores | 2048 |
| Peak Vector Performance | 622.8 TFLOPS (622.8 trillion floating point calculations per second)
(2048 CPU cores ×ばつ 304 GFLOPS) |
| Central Memory Capacity | 12 TB |
| Internode Crossbar Switch (IXS) Transfer Rate (GB/s) | 12.5 GB/s ×ばつ 2 (bidirection) |
| OS | CentOS 7 |
| Compiler | NEC SDK for VE |
| Libraries | NetCDF,GFD Cyber Library (DCL), etc. |
| Tools | GTOOL, GrADS, etc. |
Implementation research
The supercomputer implementation research themes are selected after consideration by the "Supercomputer Usage Committee", which is composed of experts from within and outside of NIES. The research results are published in the NIES Supercomputer Annual Report and Monograph Report in order to introduce a broad range of global environmental research using the Supercomputer system and to facilitate information exchange among users.
Research Programs and Representatives in FY 2024
Annual Report
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2022
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2021
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2020
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2019
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2018
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2017
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2016
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2015
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2014
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2013
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2012
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2011
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2010
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2009
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2008
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2007
- NIES Supercomputer Annual Report 2006
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 14-2005
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 13-2004
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 12-2003
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 11-2002
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 10-2001
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 9-2000(ZIP: 6.1 MB)
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 8-1999(ZIP: 6.8 MB)
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 7-1998(ZIP: 7.0 MB)
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 6-1997(ZIP: 4.1 MB)
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 5-1996(ZIP: 3.2 MB)
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 4-1995(ZIP: 2.2 MB)
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 3-1994(ZIP: 2.3 MB)
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report Vol. 2-1993(ZIP: 2.8 MB)
- CGER’S Supercomputer Activity Report 1992 Vol. 1(ZIP: 4.5 MB)
Monograph Report
- Vol. 30 Development of a process-based NICE model and simulation of ecosystem dynamics in the catchment of East Asia (Part VII)
- Vol. 29 Development of process-based NICE model and simulation of ecosystem dynamics in the catchment of East Asia (Part VI)
- Vol. 28 Development of an integrated land surface model incorporating ecosystems, human water management, crop growth, and land-use change: MIROC-INTEG-LAND
- Vol. 27 Numerical studies on the variety of climates of exoplanets using idealistic configurations
- Vol. 26 Development of process-based NICE model and simulation of ecosystem dynamics in the catchment of East Asia (Part V)
- Vol. 25 Transport modeling algorithms for application of the GOSAT observations to the global carbon cycle modeling
- Vol. 24 Development of a global aerosol climate model SPRINTARS
- Vol. 23 Improvement of a global aerosol transport model through validation and implementation of a data assimilation system
- Vol. 22 Evaluations of clouds and precipitations in NICAM using the joint simulator for satellite sensors
- Vol. 21 Influence of Anthropogenic Aerosol Emissions on Pattern Scaling Projections
- Vol. 20 Development of process-based NICE model and simulation of ecosystem dynamics in the catchment of East Asia (Part IV)
- Vol. 19 Numerical Simulations of Turbulence Structure and Scalar Transfer across the Air-Water Interfaces
- Vol. 18 Development of Process-based NICE Model and Simulation of Ecosystem Dynamics in the Catchment of East Asia (Part III)
- Vol. 17 Atmospheric Motion and Air Quality in East Asia
- Vol. 16 Idealized Numerical Experiments on the Space-time Structure of Cumulus Convection Using a Large-domain Two-dimensional Cumulus-Resolving Model
- Vol. 15 Algorithms for Carbon Flux Estimation Using GOSAT Observational Data
- Vol. 14 Development of Process-based NICE Model and Simulation of Ecosystem Dynamics in the Catchment of East Asia (Part II)
- Vol. 13 Simulations of the Stratospheric Circulation and Ozone during the Recent Past (1980-2004) with the MRI Chemistry-Climate Model
- Vol. 12 Climate Change Simulations with a Coupled Ocean-Atmosphere GCM Called the Model for Interdisciplinary Research on Climate: MIROC
- Vol. 11 Development of Process-based NICE Model and Simulation of Ecosystem Dynamics in the Catchment of East Asia (Part I)
- Vol. 10 Modeling of Daily Runoff in the Changjiang (Yangtze) River Basin and Its Application to Evaluating the Flood Control Effect of the Three Gorges Project (5.6 MB)
- Vol. 9 Vortices, Waves and Turbulence in a Rotating Stratified Fluid (1.5 MB)
- Vol. 8 Transient Climate Change Simulations in the 21st Century with the CCSR/NIES CGCM under a New Set of IPCC Scenarios (ZIP: 12.7 MB)
- Vol. 7 New Meteorological Research Institute Coupled GCM (MRI-CGCM2)-Transient Response to Greenhouse Gas and Aerosol Scenarios- (ZIP: 9.2 MB)
- Vol. 6 Tropical Precipitation Patterns in Response to a Local Warm SST Area Placed at the Equator of an Aqua Planet (ZIP: 7.4 MB)
- Vol. 5 Three-Dimensional Circulation Model Driven by Wind, Density, and Tidal Force for Ecosystem Analysis of Coastal Seas (ZIP: 4.2 MB)
- Vol. 4 Development of a Global 1-D Chemically Radiatively Coupled Model and an Introduction to the Development of a Chemically Coupled General Circulation Model (ZIP: 8.4 MB)
- Vol. 3 Study on the Climate System and Mass Transport by a Climate Model (ZIP: 3.9 MB)
- Vol. 2 A Transient CO2 Experiment with the MRI CGCM-Annual Mean Response- (ZIP: 3.0 MB)
- Vol. 1 Turbulence Structure and CO2 Transfer at the Air-Sea Interface and Turbulent Diffusion in Thermally-Stratified Flows (ZIP: 3.0 MB)
Example of research results
The supercomputer system is used for research on global environmental phenomena and problem. The system is utilized in order to reproduce and project complex natural phenomena in the atmosphere and ocean by long-term simulations covering the whole world, and to accumulate, process and analyze information on the environment and living organisms from the past to the present.
We have carried out numerical simulations on how the earth’ surface temperature changes in the future caused by global warming, based on the individual emission scenarios estimated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). We have also carried out other important simulations and future projections in a wide range of fields such as the behavior of radioactive emissions into the sea caused by the accident at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.