We welcome you back to SDSC!

SDSC HPC and Data Science Summer Institute 2022

SI Preparation Day (held virtually): Wednesday, July 27, 2022 
Summer Institute: Monday, August 1 – August 5, 2022

Current plans are for the Institute to be an in-person event held at SDSC, using the UC San Diego (UCSD) facilities for housing and dining. To attend in-person, you will need to comply with all UCSD policies regarding vaccinations, masking and testing. Details can be found at Return to Learn.  

The SDSC Summer Institute is a week-long workshop held at the University of California, San Diego focusing on a broad spectrum of introductory-to-intermediate topics in High Performance Computing and Data Science. The program is aimed at researchers in academia and industry, especially in domains not traditionally engaged in supercomputing, who have problems that cannot typically be solved using local computing resources. 

Changing structure of the Summer Institute - Two Institutes in One

This year, the Summer Institute will follow a different structure in response to the needs of our diverse user base and the increasingly diverse suite of resources and services that they need to utilize (often referred to as cyberinfrastructure). We recognize that while many researchers still need to write and parallelize their own software, a significant number of users of our supercomputers are not parallel/HPC/CI programmers (“non-programmers”). Rather, they use existing, robust third-party applications to solve problems in fields as diverse as phylogenetics, genomics, molecular biology, computational chemistry, material science, climate simulation and others. Nonetheless, these non-programmers still need to acquire specialized skills in order to effectively use advanced cyberinfrastructure.

This year’s Summer Institute will consist of two consecutive sessions, the first specifically focused on the needs of non-programmers:

Session 1 (Monday-Tuesday) Non-programming skills: Parallel computing concepts, intermediate Linux and bash scripting, hardware essentials, batch script execution, data management, cybersecurity, interactive computing, how to get help, code porting and installation, Git/GitHub, high throughput computing and Linux tools for file processing.

Session 2 (Wednesday-Friday) Programming skills: Performance tuning and optimization, profiling, parallelizing software using MPI and OpenMP, GPU programming with CUDA, Python for HPC, deep learning and scalable machine learning.

Researchers and educators from underrepresented groups and minority serving institutions (MSIs) are strongly encouraged to apply. We also encourage applications from XSEDE Campus Champions. 

The purpose of the Summer Institute is to give the attendees an overview of topics in High Performance Computing and Data Science and accelerate their learning process through highly interactive classes with hands-on tutorials on the Expanse Supercomputer.  Moreover, the attendees will have many opportunities to meet one-on-one with SDSC’s experts to discuss in detail the best techniques to solve their specific scientific problems. In order to benefit from the classes, the attendees are required to have familiarity with the UNIX/Linux shell. Basic programming skills (in any programming language) are strongly recommended.

The registration fee is $300. Applicants will be charged upon final registration after the application has been accepted. Light refreshments and lunch will be provided throughout the week to all attendees. We also will host a Monday evening reception and Thursday evening dinner.

COVID-19 Contingency plan

If we are unable to hold the event in person due to the pandemic, we will switch to a virtual institute to be held on the same dates. To avoid Zoom fatigue we will reorganize the agenda to limit lectures and instruction to a reasonable number of hours in the morning, followed by time for self-paced exercises that you can complete on your own or with partners. SDSC staff will be available throughout the day to assist you and answer your questions.

On Campus Room and Board:

With generous support from the National Science Foundation (NSF), SDSC awards a limited number of scholarships to cover on-campus room and board (dorm style private room, shared common area and bathrooms and meals). Please indicate on your application if you would like to be considered for room and board scholarship. Scholarship funds only apply to room and board and are not available for any other travel expenses.

How to Apply

The SDSC Summer Institute typically receives more than 100 applications each year and we will select approximately 45 candidates. You are welcome to apply for either session or both sessions, but acceptance to one does not guarantee acceptance to the other since different selection criteria are used for each session.

Applicants will be screened to make sure that they have the necessary background to benefit from the Summer Institute, but the main selection criterion is that the applicants have a compelling need for the skills being taught directly supporting their research or teaching.  In addition, we will try to reach the highest number of research institutions in the United States (in guidance with XSEDE eligibility), in particular those that have no access to local supercomputing resources and we will try to balance attendees from a diverse pool of scientific communities. Summer Institute Alumni are welcome to apply after 5 years.

Note: typically the Summer Institute audience is generally 50/60% Graduate students and the rest are Postdocs, Research staff at Universities and National labs, Professors, or Researchers in Industry.

Important Dates

Application Deadline:
Friday, May 13, 2022 

Applicants Notified:
Friday, June 10, 2022 

Accepted applicants to confirm attendance:
Friday, June 24, 2022 

SI Preparation Day (virtual):
Wednesday, July 27, 2022

Summer Institute:
Monday, August 1 – Friday, August 5, 2022