Benchmark Study of a 3d Parallel Code for the Propagation of Large Subduction Earthquakes

Abstract. Benchmark studies were carried out on a recently optimized parallel 3D seismic wave propagation code that uses finite differences on a staggered grid with 2nd order operators in time and 4th order in space. Three dual-core supercomputer platforms were used to run the parallel program using MPI. Efficiencies of 0.91 and 0.48 with 1024 cores were obtained on HECToR (UK) and KanBalam (Mexico), and 0.66 with 8192 cores on HECToR. The 3D velocity field pattern from a simulation of the 1985 Mexico earthquake (that caused the loss of up to 30000 people and about 7 billion US dollars) which has reasonable agreement with the available observations, shows coherent, well developed surface waves propagating towards Mexico City