The Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing (short IWR) is a scientific research institute of the Heidelberg University, Germany. It centralizes scientific activity and promotes research and work in scientific computing. Founded in 1987 by the Heidelberg University and the state of Baden-Württemberg, IWR participates in joint project and cooperations with industry in Germany as well as abroad. As a research institute with about 380 staff, IWR is considered one of the world's largest research centers for scientific computing.
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Digital Humanities at Heidelberg University
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My name is Armin Volkmann, since 1st of October I lead a new Junior Research Group with focus on Digital Humanities and Digital Cultural Heritage. The aim of Digital Cultural Heritage is „ Monument Preservation". This means heritage conservation, Archeology and Cultural Informatics. Digital Humanities help very much to identify and define standards in the context of ongoing digitizations at many universities and institutes in these days. The analysis of those digitized data is very important. New applications and digital methods generate a paradigm shift to answer new research questions. Meanwhile we have hundreds of megabytes, gigabytes and terabytes still waiting to be analysed. So we can test those on hundreds of comparable cases statistically, and not on a single case. This is the major difference to the traditional working humanities and cultural studies. Through the cooperation with the „Bayerisches Landesamt für Vermessung" it was possible to get access to high resolution laser scan data. These so called LIDAR laser scan data have a high measuring point density of one meter. With these measured data we can calculate virtual landscape models. These landscape models display the surface by filtering away the disturbing vegetation. Without the vegetation you can see the pure surface of the ground and human activities like interventions in the ground are clearly visible. This enables new perspectives to analyze hill forts like the "Heiligenberg" close to Heidelberg. If you model a monument virtual, you can often find out their complete dimensions. In landscape archaeology you can analyze the relationship between settlement and its environment systematically. So we are looking on the role of hill forts and connected settlements and the surrounding cemeteries. It is still unknown, especially at forest sites, how large the maximum dimensions of these cemeteries are. With these laser scan data we can figure it out by filtering away the disturbing trees. By bringing together methods of information technology, humanities and cultural science, we can generate new results of more significant value. Not only for single disciplines like archaeology, but also for a lots of other disciplines we can use new data material to answer new questions. We are cooperating with several other institutes located at the cluster as well as at the Heidelberg University and outside the university. We are a part of the Cluster „Asia and Europe" and the "Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing". The activities of my Junior Research Group started also as a core of the research strategy "Field of Focus 3" within the Excellence Initiative of the Heidelberg University. Because of the rapidly growing number of data assets and digital tools and methods, the Digital Humanities have to be considered as an independent discipline. Nowadays, we aren't a supporting discipline anymore, but an own field, which should get a continuity at Heidelberg University.
Objectives
The main objectives of the IWR are the
- Mathematical Modeling and Computational Simulation of Complex Systems in Science and Technology,
- Development and Use of Computer Methods and Software for Applications in Industry and Economy,
- Visualization, Computer Graphics, Image Processing and the
- Education in Scientific Computing.
Within the Zukunftskonzept (institutional strategy) of the 2nd German Universities Excellence Initiative further research and application areas were exploited with a focus on Digital Humanities and Computational archaeology.
Graduate school
Since November 2007 the training and education of Ph.D. students at IWR is supported by the Heidelberg Graduate School of Mathematical and Computational Methods for the Sciences (HGS MathComp). As part of the German Universities Excellence Initiative, HGS MathComp is a supported institution partially established and located at IWR, in order to realize innovative concepts for a structured education of Ph.D. students in interdisciplinary research projects.
Software development
The strong focus of the IWR on applied research leads from prototype implementations to maintained software, which is available as Open Source or Freeware like the
- Deal.II library,
- DUNE, which includes the
- UG[1] toolbox to solve partial differential equations on unstructured meshes or the
- GigaMesh Software Framework for processing high-resolution triangular meshes
as well as proprietary software like the
- MUSCOD-II[2] package for numerical solution of optimal control problems.
History
The initial concept of the IWR was proposed in 1985 and accepted by the University Senate two years later. After securing the necessary finances, the first parallel computer was purchased in 1989. The Graduiertenkolleg "Modellierung und Wissenschaftliches Rechnen in Mathematik und Naturwissenschaften" (Modelling and Scientific Computing in Mathematics and the Sciences) was established in 1992 and evaluated by the German Research Foundation (DFG) in 1994 and 1998.
The founding director is Willi Jäger managing the IWR from 1987 until 1998. The managing director from 1999 to 2004 was professor Jürgen Warnatz. From 2005 to 2016 the board of directors consisted of professor Hans Georg Bock as managing director, professor Willi Jäger, and professor Bernd Jähne.
In the first quarter of 2016 all the IWR groups moved to the a new building called Mathematikon[3] (Im Neuenheimer Feld 205), which can easily reached by public transportation and is located at the border of the campus at the Berliner Straße (main road). This enabled an optimal integration with the Faculty for Mathematics and Computer Science, which also moved into the Mathematikon.
Since 2017 the managing director is professor Andreas Dreuw. Michael Winckler is the administrative director of the IWR and the Heidelberg Graduate School of Mathematical and Computational Methods for the Sciences (HGS MathComp). The chairman of the HGS MathComp is professor Peter Bastian together with professor Dieter W. Hermann and professor Hans Georg Bock as deputy chairman.
External links
- Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing
- Heidelberg Graduate School of Mathematical and Computational Methods for the Sciences
References
- ^ Bastian, P.; Birken, K.; Johannsen, K.; Lang, S.; Neuß, N.; Rentz-Reichert, H.; Wieners, C. (1997), "UG – a flexible Software toolbox for solving partial differential equations", Computing and Visualization in Science, vol. 1, Springer, pp. 27–40, doi:10.1007/s007910050003, S2CID 12920083
- ^ "MUSCOD-II package for numerical solution of optimal control involving differential-algebraic equations problems". AG Simulation and Optimization at IWR.
- ^ "Mathematikon Heidelberg GmbH & Co. KG". Mathematikon - Bauteil B.
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This page was last edited on 7 April 2024, at 05:01