SC14 Announces New Plenary to Focus on the Importance of Supercomputers in Society

Inaugural “HPC Matters” Plenary to be led by SGI and NASA

NEW ORLEANS, LA – Oct. 1, 2014 – Supercomputing 2014 (SC14) is announcing a new “HPC Matters” plenary that will examine the important roles that high performance computing (HPC) plays in every aspect of society from simplifying manufacturing to tsunami warning systems and hurricane predictions to improving care for cancer patients.

"High performance computing is uniquely valuable in the world today," observes Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's Trish Damkroger, General Chair for SC14. "As researchers and engineers push the boundaries of their professions in the pursuit of a better future for all, they are rapidly moving into areas in which physical experiments are not practical, or even possible. HPC matters today more than ever."

The “HPC Matters” plenary will be led by Dr. Eng Lim Goh, senior vice president and CTO at SGI, who will demonstrate the vital nature of supercomputers across much of the world’s economic, cultural, scientific, and social accomplishments. He will also focus on numerous real world examples and will explain how much of what is made possible today, would be impossible without HPC and the role it plays across all industries.

“We have witnessed how the internet and social media have tremendously increased and fundamentally changed the connections among people, nations and cultures," said Dr. Goh. "In similar ways, wider access to high performance computing can have a democratizing effect on improving the general quality of life. This is because it can play a key role in fulfilling humanity's needs, ranging from the basics, such as food, water, shelter and health, to hardship reduction, care for the earth, commerce and entertainment as well as answering some of life’s most profound questions. Next, we need a dedicated effort to communicate key benefits in a common language so they can be appreciated by global society,” he added.

Dr. Goh has invited Dr. Piyush Mehrotra, chief, from NASA Advanced Supercomputing Division, to speak on HPC-based research that is leading us to revolutionary insights about the world.  

You won’t want to miss this exciting new “HPC Matters” plenary, so mark your calendar for 5:30 p.m. CT on November 17^th, 2014 at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center, New Orleans. 

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