[Colloquium] Seminar Announcement: The Square Kilometer Array: exascale computing in a radio telescope - TODAY!

[Ninfa Mayorga]

Computation Institute Presentation

Speaker: Chris Broekema, Researcher, ASTRON (Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy)
Host: Daniel S. Katz 
Date: December 13, 2011
Time: 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM
Location: University of Chicago, Searle 240A, 5735 S. Ellis Avenue

The Square Kilometer Array: exascale computing in a radio telescope

Abstract:
The Square Kilometer Array (SKA) is an international project that aims
to build a distributed radio telescope with a maximum baseline in the
order of 3000 km, either in South Africa or Western Australia.

Although the estimated processing requirements still vary wildly,
these are clearly beyond the capabilities of even the most modern
supercomputers. The first phase of the SKA, scheduled for first
operations in 2018, requires anywhere from several to several hundred
petaflop/s, while the full SKA, which we expect to build around 2020,
is well on its way to require far in excess of an
exaflop/s. Additionally, the I/O requirements run firmly into the
scary range of several terabytes/s.

It is clear that the SKA project is critically dependant on
improvements in high-performance computing, and the ability of the
project to efficiently leverage these improvements. It is also obvious
that the unique requirements of the SKA instrument mean that we cannot
expect a tailored solution to just appear a few years from now.

I will outline the SKA project and the experiences we've had building
some of the pathfinder instruments. I'll also look at the processing
requirements demanded by the SKA, how these match onto the projected
developments in high-performance computing and where we can expect
them to fall short.

BIO:
Chris Broekema is a researcher High Performance Computing at the
Netherlands institute for Radio Astronomy. He's worked on most of his
professional life on the computing aspects of the LOFAR radio
telescope in the broadest sense of the word, ranging from the first
prototype stations software, to the supercomputer correlator in use
today. With the LOFAR telescope now operational, he's shifting his
focus to the next generation of radio telescope, the Square Kilometer
Array.