National Center for Supercomputing Applications

The National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) is an American state-federal partnership to develop and deploy national-scale cyberinfrastructure that advances science and engineering. NCSA operates as a unit of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, although it provides high-performance computing resources to researchers across the country. Support for NCSA comes from the National Science Foundation, the state of Illinois, the University of Illinois, business and industry partners, and other federal agencies.

NCSA provides leading-edge computing, data storage, and visualization resources. NCSA computational and data environment implements a multi-architecture hardware strategy, deploying both clusters and shared memory systems to support high-end users and communities on the architectures best-suited to their requirements. Nearly 1,360 scientists, engineers and students used the computing and data systems at NCSA to support research in more than 830 projects. A list of NCSA hardware is available at NCSA Capabilities.

Larry Smarr is a physicist and leader in scientific computing, supercomputer applications, and Internet infrastructure.

He received both his BA and MS at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri and received a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Texas at Austin in 1975, did research at Princeton University, Yale, and Harvard, and then joined the faculty of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1979. He is presently a Professor of Computer Science and Information Technologies at the University of California, San Diego.

While at Illinois Smarr wrote an ambitious proposal to address the future needs of scientific research. Seven other University of Illinois professors joined as co-Principal Investigators, and many others provided descriptions of what could be accomplished if the proposal were accepted. Formally titled A Center for Scientific and Engineering Supercomputing but known as the Black Proposal (after the color of its cover), it was submitted to the National Science Foundation in 1983. A scant 10 pages long, it was the first unsolicited proposal accepted and approved by the NSF, and resulted in the charter of four supercomputer centers (Cornell, Illinois, Princeton, and San Diego), with a fifth (Pittsburgh) added later. In 1985 Smarr became the first director of the Illinois center, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications.

Donna J. Cox is an American artist and scientist, Professor of Art + Design; Director, Advanced Scientific Visualization Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC); Director, Visualization and Experimental Technologies at National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA); and Director, edream (Illinois Emerging Digital Research and Education in Arts Media Institute). She is a recognized pioneer in computer art and scientific visualization.

Donna Cox received a B.A. at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1982, and a Master of Fine Arts degree in CGA at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1985.

In 1985 she became a Visiting Assistant Professor at UIUC, in 1990 Associate Professor at the School of Art + Design and since 1992 a Full Professor. In the same period she started as an Adjunct Professor and Research Artist/Scientist at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) in 1985, became an Associate Director for Education in 1989, Co-Director, Scientific Communications and Media Systems in 1992, Director of the Virtual Director Group in 1997 and Director, Visualization and Experimental Technologies in 2002 and since 2006 Director, Advanced Scientific Visualization Laboratory at the NCSA. From 1989 to 1996 she was Project Leader/PI, Renaissance Experimental Lab, at the NCSA.