Leveraging 30+ years of development to accelerate new research
This presentation will describe the creation of a sustainable and efficient HPC platform for non-smooth (discrete & discontinuous) mechanics by integrating the first parallelised discrete exterior calculus (DEC) math library into the well-established open-source FE library ParaFEM. DEC is a relatively new mathematical framework in solid mechanics built on a discrete view of the world, making it ideal for simulating non-smooth physical processes at a fundamental level. Integrating the libraries has accelerated the development and application of DEC, as well as related methods, through the reuse of optimised code for partitioning & load balancing, parallel I/O, inter-process communication patterns, and scalable solvers. We will discuss some of the performance benefits realised in four mini-applications for (steady, transient, and heterogeneous) diffusion and elastic problems, as well as the challenges encountered through this process. We will also discuss some of the opportunities this project has created to integrate DEC into existing ParaFEM frameworks for multiscale and multiphysics problems.
This online session is open to all. It will use the Blackboard Collaborate platform.