Submission information
Submission Number: 44
Submission ID: 70
Submission UUID: d0c9ed13-bf67-4c75-bf5d-6c659c25e396
Submission URI: /form/project
Created: Tue, 06/16/2020 - 16:27
Completed: Tue, 06/16/2020 - 16:31
Changed: Wed, 07/29/2020 - 18:26
Remote IP address: 96.252.12.25
Submitted by: Kristi Burkholder
Language: English
Is draft: No
Webform: Project
| Project Title | Tracing Oceanic Pathways using High Resolution Model Output |
|---|---|
| Program | Northeast |
| Project Leader | Kristin Burkholder |
| kburkholder@stonehill.edu | |
| Mobile Phone | 570-337-1063 |
| Work Phone | 508-565-1047 |
| Mentor(s) | Chris Hill |
| Student-facilitator(s) | Nicholas Colella |
| Mentee(s) | |
| Project Description | The amazingly productive waters of the Gulf of Maine (GOM) support one of the most biodiverse and economically important marine habitats in the world. This productivity relies on adequate concentrations of nutrients being transported into the photic zone during times of the year when significant amounts of sunlight are present. As such, an understanding of the nature and variability of the pathways that deliver nutrients to the photic zone is desirable. Since studying the real ocean is experimentally difficult, models of ocean circulation can provide valuable information to researchers about the nature of ocean circulation. My research relies on using output from one such model, the Regional Ocean Modeling System (ROMS), to investigate nutrient pathways in the GOM and how they are changing as oceanic temperatures warm. In order to study pathways in the ROMS model, my lab makes use of a code called LTRANS (http://northweb.hpl.umces.edu/LTRANS.htm) to launch synthetic "drifters" in the model and to calculate their trajectories through the GOM using the model velocity fields (which vary in time). However, running this code becomes quite time and resource intensive: for each "drifter" launched, the computer must calculate a new position at each time step through the time-varying velocity field. I hope that the Cyberteam will help me to make this process more efficient such that my students and I are able to access the data more easily and run larger numbers of trajectories without being limited by computational power. |
| Project Deliverables | - Store model output data that is currently stored in dropbox on the cluster so that it can be accessed readily from my laptop (and those of my students, ideally). Currently when working with the data, I have to download it in chunks to my laptop, do a subset of the analysis, then move some of the data back to dropbox prior to downloading the next chunk. This is a time intensive process- it would be great if it was stored in a place where these acrobatics were not necessary. - Download the LTRANS source code (and associated files as needed) and set up to run on the cluster using the model output data mentioned in the previous bullet. - Alter the code as needed to allow to run as efficiently as possible (allowing for larger numbers of floats to be run as quickly as possible). - Setting up a system by which multiple student users can run the code independently. |
| Project Deliverables | |
| Student Research Computing Facilitator Profile | I am open to working with any Cyberteam student that feels that they have the expertise to complete this project. However, a student that has some experience working with Fortran (the LTRANS code is written in Fortran 90) would be beneficial. |
| Mentee Research Computing Profile | |
| Student Facilitator Programming Skill Level | |
| Mentee Programming Skill Level | |
| Project Institution | Stonehill College |
| Project Address | 320 Washington St. Easton, Massachusetts. 02357 |
| Anchor Institution | NE-MGHPCC |
| Preferred Start Date | 05/30/2019 |
| Start as soon as possible. | |
| Project Urgency | |
| Expected Project Duration (in months) | |
| Launch Presentation | |
| Launch Presentation Date | |
| Wrap Presentation | |
| Wrap Presentation Date | |
| Project Milestones | |
| Github Contributions | |
| Planned Portal Contributions (if any) | NA |
| Planned Publications (if any) | This summer my students and I are working on model validation by comparing the model fields to observational records. After completing this analysis, we plan to run the trajectories described above and hope to publish our findings. |
| What will the student learn? | My background is in physical oceanography, NOT in computer science. In my (very small) research lab, I'm currently operating right at the edge of my knowledge base. My impression is that one of the major goals for the students that participate with the cyber team is to learn how to teach faculty researchers how to use a HPC to improve their research. I will make a very enthusiastic student of your student! I'm sure they will get lots of experience explaining to me what they're doing/how they're doing it/why it works etc. |
| What will the mentee learn? | |
| What will the Cyberteam program learn from this project? | I'm a faculty member at a very small school (~2500 undergrads, only one masters program in a non-STEM field) and our computer resources and supports are extremely limited (our IT team is fabulous, but not involved in research computing). I hope that the conversations that we may have could help the Cyberteam identify some of the potential services that might be beneficial to faculty at small schools. When I was at Duke we had a research computing support system... nothing like that exists at Stonehill and I would really benefit from some of those supports! |
| HPC resources needed to complete this project? | Storage space (~50 MB for each of ~4000 data files) Processing power and speed (the more the better, though I don't have specific thresholds I'm looking for) |
| Notes | Thank you for considering this proposal! |
| What is the impact on the development of the principal discipline(s) of the project? | |
| What is the impact on other disciplines? | |
| Is there an impact physical resources that form infrastructure? | |
| Is there an impact on the development of human resources for research computing? | |
| Is there an impact on institutional resources that form infrastructure? | |
| Is there an impact on information resources that form infrastructure? | |
| Is there an impact on technology transfer? | |
| Is there an impact on society beyond science and technology? | |
| Lessons Learned | |
| Overall results |