From the Program Manager

Dr. William J. Feiereisen
Program Manager, High Performance Computing and Communications Program
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
NASA Ames Research Center
Moffett Field, California

Issue 2, May 1997

Text Only F E A T U R E S Striving for Peak Design Students as Astronomers UCLA Climate Models -----RETURN TO COVER----- I N - B R I E F NASA HPCC News -----RETURN TO COVER----- E V E N T S NASA HPCC Recent Events -----RETURN TO COVER-----

Insights is published by the High Performance Computing and Communications (HPCC) Program Office. Address changes to Judy Conlon or write to: NASA HPCC Insights, Mail Stop 269-3, Moffett Field, California 94035-1000, USA

Welcome to INSIGHTS, NASA's newsletter on the High Performance Computing and Communications (HPCC) Program. Since the last issue, many interesting developments have occurred in the program.

For example, the Clinton administration announced the "Next Generation Internet (NGI)" and the accompanying Internet II. As many of you know, the existing Internet is regularly the site of massive electronic traffic jams, motivating research into a faster successor. NASA will participate in the NGI through increased network research in our NASA Research and Education Network project. Over the next year, you will see additional emphasis on applications, such as remote visualization and distance learning in parallel with the traditional supercomputing uses of high-speed networks.

Within the Computational Aerosciences project, we support the development of parallel computing applications that directly bear upon the design of aerospace vehicles. An excellent example of this work is the Numerical Propulsion Simulation System (NPSS) developed at NASA Lewis Research Center.

NASA's HPCC supports an extensive education program. Inside this issue is an article on Telescopes in Education, a project carried out through the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory that allows classroom access to a computer-controlled telescope atop Mount Wilson in the Los Angeles area. This article demonstrates the expanding use of the Internet in education.

This issue of INSIGHTS celebrates the HPCC program and its many research partners outside of NASA. Roberto Mechoso, professor of Atmospheric Sciences at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and his colleagues have developed global climate models that allow the long-term prediction of trends in our climate. We support his work through the Earth and Space Sciences Project.

This newsletter gives insight into some of the activities we have in the NASA HPCC Program. We also invite your communication to us. Please send us your thoughts and views on the enclosed reply card, or via e-mail.

Bill Feiereisen
wfeiereisen@mail.arc.nasa.gov