Nvidia to Discuss at SCA 2021 How HPC and AI Aid in COVID-19 Battle

NVIDIA will be presenting two talks at SupercomputingAsia (SCA) 2021 on how high performance computing (HPC) and artificial intelligence (AI) are aiding in the battle against COVID-19.

At the conference, which will be held virtually from March 2 to 4, 2021, the two speakers – both of whom are winners of Gordon Bell Special Prize for High Performance Computing-Based COVID-19 Research – will share how these advanced technologies are helping scientists better understand the virus to come up with drug discoveries.

Dr Rommie Amaro, Professor and Endowed Chair of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California at San Diego, will speak on Simulating the SARS-CoV-2 Virus with AI and HPC. She will discuss her laboratory’s efforts, together with collaborators, in using HPC and AI at unprecedented scales to understand the SARS-CoV-2 virus in atomic detail, with the goals of better understanding the molecular recognition of the virus and host cell receptors, antibody binding and design, and searching for novel therapeutics. 

Her talk will focus on studies of the spike protein, its glycan shield and interactions with the human ACE2 receptor, and efforts to model the SARS-CoV-2 virion and escape variants. Catch Dr Amaro’s presentation on March 2 from 11.00 to 11.30am (Singapore time).

Backed by more than 30 years of experience in HPC, Tom Gibbs, Manager, Developer Relations, NVIDIA will talk about Solving The Grand Challenge Science Problem of Our Time: How the Convergence of HPC*AI is Being Used to Address the COVID-19 Pandemic.

He will touch on the critical Grand Challenges of Science that require the convergence of conventional HPC and AI methods to model and solve. Gibbs will provide an overview of the challenges that are magnified due to the end of Moore’s Law and Dennard Scaling, and provide examples of how the converged methods are being used successfully toward solving Grand Challenges including the response to the pandemic. Tune in to his talk on March 3 from 3.00 to 3.20pm.

Gil Bloch, Principal Architect of Networking Software and System at NVIDIA will talk about Revolutionising Supercomputing on March 3 from 5.00 to 5.20pm.

Gilad Shainer, Senior Vice President of Networking at NVIDIA and Chairman of HPC-AI Advisory Council will give the plenary speech to talk about Cloud Native Supercomputing on March 3 from 12.30 to 1.00pm.  To handle the ever growing demands for higher computation performance and the increase in the complexity of research problems, the world of scientific computing continues to re-innovate itself in a fast pace. The session will review the recent development of the cloud native supercomputing architecture, aiming on bringing together bare metal performance and cloud services. 

Besides these talks, platinum sponsor NVIDIA is also invited to deliver some speeches at the APAC HPC-AI Competition Award Ceremony on March 2.  Gilad Shainer will speak on Fostering the Next Generation of Supercomputing (10.05-10.15am). Ashrut Ambastha, Principal Engineer, Solution Architect, Networking Business Unit at NVIDIA will present on Introducing DPU and Advancements Towards in-Network Computing (11.30-11.40am), while Dr Li Xipeng, Senior Manager of DevTech Compute APAC at NVIDIA, will talk about How GPU Change the HPC, AI, and them Together (11.40-11.50am).

NVIDIA will also have a virtual booth where participants can visit, learn more about NVIDIA technologies, and chat with the team.

“In a world that is greatly disrupted by the pandemic, it is heartening to see how NVIDIA technologies are making a major difference by empowering scientists in their research to come up with vaccines that will save lives and livelihoods,” said Raymond Teh, Vice President, Worldwide Field Operations (Asia Pacific), NVIDIA.

Co-organised by HPC centres from Singapore, Japan and Australia, SCA21 is an annual conference that attracted more than 700 participants from over 20 countries in 2019. It aims to promote a vibrant and relevant HPC ecosystem in Asia. This year’s theme is Supercomputing in the New Norm – Adapting to COVID-19 and Beyond.