4D simulation of continental

deformation in the western US:

Integrating high performance
computing with data infrastructure
using the GEON grid

Mian Liu, Huai Zhang & Youqing Yang

University of Missouri-Columbia
San Diego Supercomputer

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

 Outline

• The science drive

• Preliminary modeling results: old and new
• A new approach for community
computational service

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

Diffuse deformation in the western US

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

EarthScope and other studies promise
unprecedented growth of observational data

Data integration & interpretation

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

A Preliminary Finite Element Model of Active
Crustal Deformation in the Western US

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org
 The Power of GEON Cluster Nodes
Original model Current model (2-nodes, 4CPUs)
(single CPU)

(x 40 vertical topographic exaggeration)

•More than 800,000 unstructured elements

•Less than 3000 elements
•Major Faults and more deformation zones
•Three layers in R-direction
•Subduction zone
•2 min for per time step
•21 layers in R-direction
•15 min per time step

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

The fine mesh allows important details
to be included in the model

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

Automatic domain decomposition
for parallel computing

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

 Automatic data partitioning and
communication among sub-domains
Domain partitioning with minimized
inter-boundaries (blue area) for
parallel communication

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

 The model now allows simulation of large scale
continental deformation with unprecedented detail
Displacement-x

Displacement-y

displacement-z

Vertical stress

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

 The model now allows simulation of large scale
continental deformation with unprecedented detail

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

 What’s next…
• Modeling active tectonics and the 4D
continental deformation history in the
western US

• Develop a modeling language based

computing environment for GEON

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

How to integrate GEON data infrastructure
with computing resources to facilitate
scientific investigations?

Physical
model
HPCC
Interne
t
Data
Grid

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

A prototype of an integrated modeling
environment on the GEON grid
Automatic
code
generator!

Physical
model
HPCC
Interne
t
Data
Grid

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org

 Data =>??? Physical model

PDEs

func FEM Modeling  xx  xy  xz

funa=+[u/x]    fx  0
……… Language x y z
funf=+[u/y]+[v/x]  xy  yy  yz
   fy  0
……… x y z
GEON Data dist
 xz  yz  zz
=+[funa;funa]*d(1,1)+[funa;funb]*d(1,2)+[funa;func]*d(1,3)    fz  0
+[funb;funa]*d(2,1)+[funb;funb]*d(2,2)+[funb;func]*d(2,3) x y z
+[func;funa]*d(3,1)+[func;funb]*d(3,2)+[func;func]*d(3,3)
+[fund;fund]*d(4,4)+[fune;fune]*d(5,5)+[funf;funf]*d(6,6)

load = +[u]*fu+[v]*fv+[w]*fw-[funa]*f(1)-[funb]*f(2)-[func]*f(3)
-[fund]*f(4)-[fune]*f(5)-[funf]*f(6)

Complete
Automatic source
source code
Model results code generator

GEON HPCC
CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org
Thank you!

CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE GEOSCIENCES www.geongrid.org