Blue Waters to continue full operations into 2019
Since the Blue Waters petascale system was deployed in 2013, scientists and engineers have been able to tackle larger and more complex challenges and to break new ground in a wide range of disciplines. In recognition of the successes enabled by Blue Waters to date and of the national research community's need for extreme-scale computational and data resources, the National Science Foundation will extend the Blue Waters project into 2019.
This is excellent news for science and engineering teams across the country that need petascale resources to address pressing research questions! The NSF Petascale Computing Resource Allocation (PRAC) process will be carried forward, with new allocations being awarded in 2017 and 2018. [NOTE: The next deadline for PRAC applications is Nov. 9, 2016. See https://www.nsf.gov/funding/pgm_summ.jsp?pims_id=503224.]
The extension of the Blue Waters project also means that the related undergraduate and graduate education activities will continue into 2019, helping to inspire and train the next generation of computational scientists.
The dedicated Blue Waters team at NCSA looks forward to ongoing collaborations with our science and engineering partners as they continue to innovate and discover.
I would also like to make note of several transitions at NCSA. NCSA Director Ed Seidel has been named interim vice president for research for the University of Illinois system. I look forward to continuing to work with Ed in this new role as he works with the system's three universities to help manage their nearly $1 billion sponsored-research portfolio and to oversee technology commercialization and economic development activities. While he holds the interim vice president position, William Groppa Blue Waters Co-PI, the Thomas M. Siebel Chair in Computer Science, and director of the Parallel Computing Institutehas assumed the role of acting NCSA director. And finally, I would like to congratulate long-serving NCSA executive director Danny Powell on a well-earned retirement! Danny has been with NCSA through countless grants, projects, changes, and challenges, and he will be missed.
Bill Kramer
Blue Waters Project Director
