Ocean Circulation on the Intel Paragon: Modeling and Implementation

In this paper, we present the modeling and implementa-tion of a grand-challenge problem in the field of scientific computation: the Primitive-Equation Numerical Ocean Cir-culation Model. We present the mathematical formulation of the model and propose a scheme for its parallel imple-mentation. Optimizations are made through collective com-munications and various partitioning schemes. In our ex-periments using up to 100 processors on the Intel Paragon parallel computer, the proposed strategy yields an encour-aging speedup and exhibits a sustained scalability with in-creasing both the problem and machine sizes. We consider barotropic continental shelf waves an a periodic channel as a test problem. The model has numerous applications in environmental studies and ocean sciences.