PAC Decade: witness HPC from CPU era to XPU Era

10+ Scientific research fields ,

43 city ,

50+ Industry experts ,

400+ Colleges and universities / Company ,

1,500+ team ,

13,000+ Teachers and students ,

2,347 Ten thousand exposures ……

Ten year cooperation , Achieve benchmarking events .

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In recent days, , Guided by the high performance computing Professional Committee of the Chinese computer society , Hosted by Intel China , Undertaken by Beijing Parallel Technology Co., Ltd  2022 The 10th “ Intel ” Cup National parallel application challenge (PAC 2022)  Officially launched in Beijing .

Adhering to the consistent purpose , This time PAC It is still facing major scientific research institutions in the field of high-performance computing in China 、 Developers or users of parallel computing and related applications in key universities and science and innovation enterprises , The purpose is to train the contestants' parallel computing ideas and parallel computing system capabilities , And discover the best in the application of high-performance computing industry in China .

After ten years of deep cultivation and evolution , It should be said PAC It has become a challenge representing the level of academic research and practical application in the field of high-performance computing in China . In the past ten years, he has preached and competed in the knowledge and experience of parallel optimization of high-performance computing , What extraordinary achievements have been made ？ The new competition , What new vitality will be injected into the academic and industrial circles ？ Let's find out ！

Welcome the new year in ten years ,

Unlock high-performance computing XPU Platform core opportunities

This year is PAC In the 10th year , It is also supported by Intel China PAC The tenth year of .

Time goes back to 2013 year . To cultivate supercomputing talents , from Sunninghui, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering 、 Zheng Weimin, academician of the Chinese Academy of engineering, and CCF Co sponsored by Secretary General Zhang Yunquan of high performance computing Professional Committee ,CCF The high performance computing Professional Committee and Intel China Co sponsored 、 Parallel technology contractor , Under the guidance and support of many experts and scholars ,PAC（ Formerly known as “ National education and scientific research parallel application optimization competition ”） emerge as the times require . From then on , Intel China as a co host has always been convenient for PAC Provide hardware platform 、 Software tools and related training .

Vice president of Intel Research 、 Dr. Song Jiqiang, President of Intel China Research Institute, said , New changes this year , It is because Intel has provided the competition based on Intel  Xe-HP GPU High performance computing software development platform . The platform is installed with the third generation Intel   To the strong   Scalable processors, high-density computing devices and ultra-high bandwidth HBM2e In memory GPU, Provide competition support for contestants .

With the hardware support platform from the original based on CPU Turned to based on XPU（CPU+GPU） Heterogeneous platforms , Intel also offers an open and standards based unified software stack for software oneAPI, It is Intel for the future XPU Core software tools built by heterogeneous architecture , The specialty is to eliminate the programming complexity caused by heterogeneity . When users write software for heterogeneous platforms through their unified programming interface , Be able to write at one time , It can automatically match and adapt to chips with different architectures and uses without any modification , And achieve better efficiency .

In order to let the contestants make full use of the new software and hardware product portfolio provided this year ,PAC Special awards have also been set up in the competition ——oneAPI Technology Innovation Award , It aims to encourage the participating teams to use this heterogeneous computing programming language and tool based on Open Industrial Standards . On the basis of maintaining code portability , Make more efficient use of CPU、GPU Wait for accelerated hardware , Achieve better cross architecture performance portability .

HPC + AI + Practical scenarios ,

Explore more possibilities together

With 2017 In, the application of science and technology accelerated to AI As the core of the second half , It has been emphasized to keep pace with the times PAC Also this year, it officially opened up artificial intelligence “ New battlefield ”. When the competition sparks with cutting-edge technology , And when the capabilities of high-performance computing overflow and penetrate into the artificial intelligence infrastructure ,PAC It has also become more mature and professional in accelerating the ecological expansion of the competition , It has become one of the few paradigms and models in the high-performance computing competition .

In terms of competition questions ,PAC Since its inception , Always adhere to the actual production scenario as the starting point , Try to restore the real production scenario , Let the competition become the continuation and optimization of the production environment . these years , The direction of the competition also basically covers many typical application scenarios of high-performance computing , Such as ： Weather, ocean 、 Life science 、 Hydrodynamics, etc .

Based on these principles , This year's PAC Also adhere to the parallel optimization Group （ Optimization Group ） And parallel application group （ Application Group ） Division , Both groups use the previously mentioned Intel high performance computing software development platform . Optimization group unified proposition unified platform ; The application group selects topics by themselves and is not limited to fields , The entries should be practical and scientific 、 Algorithm innovation 、 Parallelization implementation 、 Method universality and application promotion are four dimensions , Submit complete entries .

Regarding this , Academician, Chinese academy of engineering 、 Sunninghui, CO chairman of the competition Steering Committee, said ：“ Thanks to the competition advancing with the times 、 Constantly changing the theme settings to meet the needs of the times , And the continuous investment of Intel and other enterprises for ten years ,PAC The competition has been successful with you for ten years . I believe that as long as our love and passion for parallel computing remain , The competition can move forward , Create more value for society .”

Fearless challenge ,

Respond to the call of the times for talents

Talents are important for the development and application of emerging technologies , Is an essential foundation , and PAC In the past decade , It can be said that it provides a fertile ground for cultivating and selecting excellent talents in the field of high-performance computing . Academician, Chinese academy of engineering 、 Zhengweimin, honorary chairman of the competition Steering Committee, pointed out in his speech ：“ For training high-performance computing talents , In addition to laying a good theoretical foundation through course learning , Practice is also essential , Participate in PAC The competition can greatly improve the contestants' system ability .”

PAC 2013-2021 Wonderful review

At the call of the times ,PAC Go new , It not only provides new ideas for the development of parallel applications and the cultivation of compound talents through the competition , But also for the accelerated cross integration of different disciplines and “ Production, ” The development of integration builds a bridge .

It is reported that , over these years , Including this year's PAC The team with outstanding achievements , Not only can you get the certificate issued by the organizing committee 、 Bonus , There is also a chance to get job opportunities from relevant support units of the competition . And so far ,PAC The direct participants of the competition have exceeded 13,000 Person time , A large number of excellent talents participating in the competition may go to scientific research 、 Production post , Or become a new generation of instructor of the team , Continuously inject new vitality into the development of domestic supercomputing industry .

Entry process

review PAC Over the past decade , Look forward to the next or even more decades , Support for this event is both persistence 、 It is also faith . Stand at the starting point of the future , Intel will never forget “ Run up for contestants , Accelerate for practitioners ” At first , Help cultivate high-performance computing talents with more and better product technologies , Deliver vitality to the industry ; meanwhile , It will also help cross industry competitions , Cooperate to cultivate and create compound talents , Meet the challenges of the real world with more internationally influential application achievements .

As vice president of Intel Research 、 Dr. Song Jiqiang, President of Intel China Research Institute, is in PAC 2022 As it was said at the opening ceremony ：“ Next decade , We hope to do better .”