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International Conference on Computational Science

ICCS 2003: Computational Science — ICCS 2003 pp 905–915Cite as

A Performance Model of Non-deterministic Particle Transport on Large-Scale Systems

Part of the Lecture Notes in Computer Science book series (LNCS,volume 2659)

Abstract

In this work we present a predictive analytical model that encompasses the performance and scaling characteristics of a non-deterministic particle transport application, MCNP. Previous studies on the scalability of parallel Monte Carlo eigenvalue calculations have been rather general in nature [[1]]. It can be used for the simulation of neutron, photon, electron, or coupled transport, and has found uses in many problem areas. The performance model is validated against measurements on an AlphaServer ES40 system showing high accuracy across many processor / problem combinations. It is parametric with both application characteristics (e.g. problem size), and system characteristics (e.g. communication latency, bandwidth, achieved processing rate) serving as input. The model is used to provide insight into the achievable performance that should be possible on systems containing thousands of processors and to quantify the impact that possible improvements in sub-system performance may have. In addition, the impact on performance of modifying the communication structure of the code is also quantified.

Keywords

  • Communication Cost
  • Alamos National Laboratory
  • Discrete Ordinate
  • Achievable Performance
  • Scatter Phase

These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

Mathis is supported in part by a DOE High-Performance Computer Science Fellowship. Los Alamos National Laboratory is operated by the University of California for the National Nuclear Security Administration of the US Department of Energy.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dept. of Computer Science, Texas A&M University, USA

    Mark M. Mathis

  2. Performance and Architectures Lab, CCS-3, Los Alamos National Laboratory, USA

    Darren J. Kerbyson & Adolfy Hoisie

Authors
  1. Mark M. Mathis
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  2. Darren J. Kerbyson
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  3. Adolfy Hoisie
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Informatics Institute, Section of Computational Science, University of Amsterdam, Kruislaan 403, 1098 SJ, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Peter M. A. Sloot

  2. School of Computer Science and Software Engineering, Monash University, Wellington Road, Clayton, VIC 3800, Australia

    David Abramson

  3. Institute for High-Performance Computing and Information Systems, Fontanka emb. 6, St. Petersburg, 191187, Russia

    Alexander V. Bogdanov & Yuriy E. Gorbachev & 

  4. Computer Science Dept., University of Tennessee and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, 1122 Volunteer Blvd., Knoxville, TN, 37996-3450, USA

    Jack J. Dongarra

  5. School of Information Technologies, CISCO Systems, The University of Sydney, Madsen Building F09, Sydney, NSW, 2006, Australia

    Albert Y. Zomaya

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© 2003 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Mathis, M.M., Kerbyson, D.J., Hoisie, A. (2003). A Performance Model of Non-deterministic Particle Transport on Large-Scale Systems. In: Sloot, P.M.A., Abramson, D., Bogdanov, A.V., Gorbachev, Y.E., Dongarra, J.J., Zomaya, A.Y. (eds) Computational Science — ICCS 2003. ICCS 2003. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 2659. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44863-2_89

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44863-2_89

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-40196-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-44863-1

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