• Thad Harroun (Physics, Director)
• Sidney Segalowitz (Psychology)
• Thomas Wolf (Mathematics and Statistics)

The Brock Institute for Scientific Computing (BISC) advances scholarship at Brock University through enabling research utilizing high performance computing (HPC).

In recent years, computing has become a significant aspect of research, to the extent where it is now widely recognized as a third pillar of science, along with theory and experimentation. Concomitant with the growth in computing technology is a rapid increase in the complexity of maintaining cutting edge equipment and developing scientific applications that work well and correctly.

The current renewal of BISC as a cross-disciplinary research institute at Brock is timely given the significant amount of new CFI funded HPC hardware and big-data software initiatives that will be installed in Ontario over the next couple of years.

BISC works to promote multi-disciplinary and collaborative research that uses high-performance computers to generate and/or analyze scientific and research data. At present its members are drawn from a wide range of disciplines within the faculties of Mathematics and Science, Social Science, and Applied Health Sciences. There are currently 18 Brock faculty with active Compute Canada accounts used to access SHARCNet HPC resources in Ontario. (13 in the Faculty of Mathematics and Science, 3 in the Faculty of Social Sciences, and 2 in the Faculty of Applied Health Sciences.)

The principal executive of BISC, past and present, include researchers actively engaged in HPC as a necessary tool of their research. Brock HPC users are also at the cutting-edge of computational-based research in their fields. BISC is proud to note that Brock students have won two of the last three best poster awards at the Compute Ontario Research Day conferences (in 2013 and 2015).

• To facilitate inter-departmental knowledge sharing and creation in computationally driven research.
• To extend the breadth of the computationally driven research fields to additional Faculties and Schools at Brock. (E.g. BISC does not currently include members from Goodman School of Business or Faculty of Humanities. We have already begun liaising with proponents of ``big data'' initiatives at the Goodman School.) With this expansion in scope, we will be considering a name change from Brock Institute for Scientific Computing to Brock Institute for Research Computing in the near future.
• To strengthen the current relationship with the Brock Library as a central hub for outreach and collaboration.
• To strengthen the current relationship with the Brock Library in establishing the computational resources available through the library (e.g. data access, archival data storage).
• To collectively represent the needs of Brock HPC users to Brock's Information Technology Services.
• To facilitate the communication and sharing of resources (expertise and hardware) among BISC members.
• To work with SHARCNet and Compute Canada to develop HPC support expertise and train researchers to use HPC effectively and efficiently.
• To facilitate the use of state-of-the-art computational tools as an integral part of research at the undergraduate and graduate levels.
• To strengthen the University's position when applying for large-scale funding and to ensure that such opportunities are successfully exploited.
• To facilitate the University's attraction and retention of high-quality researchers, from all areas of computationally driven research, and to help them to launch new, multidisciplinary research programs.
• To raise the external profile of the University in computationally driven research, through Agreement of Cooperation with internationally recognized institutes of research and education.
• To advocate for, and assist with solving, administrative issues associated with the running of large-scale computational resources.

• Thad Harroun, Associate Professor of Physics, is currently the SHARCNet site leader for Brock, and Director of BISC. Thad has received Compute Canada Resource Allocation Competition awards in 2015 and 2016 on SHARCNet HPC resources for computational simulations of antibiotic interactions with cell membranes. One of Thad's students won the poster prize at the 2013 Compute Ontario Research day for this research. He has had four papers in 2014 and 2015 utilizing HPC resources in the fields of granular physics and membrane biophysics.
• Sidney J. Segalowitz, Professor of Psychology and Director of the Centre for Lifespan Development Research, is currently part of a large consortium funded by the Ontario Brain Institute (OBI) studying cerebral palsy (CP-NET). The group has collected EEG from a test cohort and are currently processing the data on SHARCNet. Sid's research also supports a student in an Ontario Centres of Excellence project with Brain-CODE, an OBI-INDOC consortium at the High Performance Computing Virtual Laboratory (HPCVL) and with industry partner Digital Medical Experts (DME). He has 5 publications in 2014 and 2015 that make extensive use of SHARCNet HPC, and one of Sid's students won the poster prize at the 2015 Compute Ontario Research day. He together with James Desjardins (see below) has organized a Consortium of 7 major research centres utilizing HPC and is currently awaiting decision on a major proposal to the Canadian Foundation for Innovation Cyber-Infrastructure competition designed to expand the use of HPC for EEG/MEG and brain imaging researchers.
• Thomas Wolf, Professor of Mathematics and past SHARCNet site-leader, has two publications utilizing SHARCNet HPC resources in the past 12 months, in mathematical physics and exactly solvable and integrable systems. Thomas is also a regular contributor to Compute Ontario Research Day conferences. One of the two papers originated from a one month visit of four graduate students and a one week visit of their 2 supervisors which led to a mutual agreement between Brock and the Ufa State Aviation Technical University in Russia.
• In 2015 James Desjardins transitioned from Research Associate at the Brock Lifespan centre to a support position fully funded by SHARCNet located at Brock. Currently, a majority of James' time has been working on projects distributed among SHARCNet, and the wider Compute Canada, institutions. However, we expect that allocating more time to local initiatives like BISC would be encouraged by SHARCNet. Through Compute Canada James is also involved in developing new "software carpentry" curricula (loosely named "data carpentry" and "HPC carpentry") that is planned to be piloted at Brock in 2016.
• Stuart Rothstein, Professor Emeritus of Chemistry and Physics, and principle Executive Director of BISC for a number of years, remains an active HPC user. His novel pure sampling quantum Monte Carlo (PSQMC) algorithm for the calculation of various electronic properties of molecules, published in 2015, was proved in principle using SHARCNet resources. Notably, Stuart was invited to present papers on his HPC-related research at quantum Monte Carlo sessions held in December at the PACIFICHEM meeting in Honolulu. These sessions had been held in Stuart's honour in recognition of the numerous contributions his lab has made to the field.

• The Institute coordinates an Agreement of Cooperation with the Graduate School of System Informatics at Kobe University for joint research activities, faculty exchange, and student exchange at the graduate level. Under this arrangement, one student from Kobe was able to conduct research at Brock with Prof. Michael Winters (Computer Science) in 2013. This agreement expired in 2015, and Prof Shigenori Tanaka has committed to renewing the agreement for another two-year term.
• SHARCNet and Compute Canada are the primary access points for collaborative HPC hardware, software, research and training available to Brock researchers in Ontario. Thus Brock's continued cooperation with SHARCNet will be facilitated through BISC and SHARCNet staff member James Desjardins.
• The majority of HPC is performed using unix-based software. BISC will work to support the use of unix users in cooperation with Brock Information Technology Services. These efforts will include a support student for unix and HPC user support to supplement the services provided by ITS.
• In April 2016 BISC will be joining Brock's Lifespan Centre and SHARCNet to co-hosted a third, week-long EEG workshop that with attendees from several high impact research groups in Ontario. The first successful event was held in May 2014.
• Beginning Summer and Fall 2016, BISC and SHARCNet will head up several outreach and training initiatives. These include presenting resource information at all graduate student orientation events, and hosting domain focused multiple ``software carpentry'' type events. Specific research domains to be targeted include computational, theoretical, and soft matter physics, mathematics, genomics, biology, applied health science, and neuroscience.

Membership

1. Membership is open to all faculty and staff who utilize high performance computing as part of their research and scholarship.
2. Request for membership may be made in writing to the Executive Committee, or new members may be invited by the Executive Committee.
3. Member participation will be through sharing in their expertise and experience of HPC, as well as coordinate participation in internal and external research promotional activities.
4. Associate membership will be extended to SHARCNet-funded resource persons based at Brock.
5. Emeritus membership will be extended to Emertius faculty who wish to continue their research and collaborations.

The Director of BISC

1. The Director shall be chosen from among the Executive Committee, and shall be its Chair. Normally, the Director's term of service shall be for three years.
2. The Director shall be responsible for the implementation of BISC's strategy for achieving its aims and for guiding its intellectual development.
3. The Director shall prepare a biennial self-assessment report for consideration by the Senate Research and Scholarship Policy Committee, which analyses the performance of the BISC against the following criteria, it being noted that the self-assessment may be supplementary to any reports required by an external sponsor:
   1. the number of students and researchers assisted in accessing and utilizing HPC resources;
   2. the volume of research activity as demonstrated by research grants and contracts, publications or other appropriate output;
   3. the breadth of research activity as demonstrated by the variety of participating departments and faculties;
   4. the impact on the recruitment of research students in departments connected to BISC.
4. The Director shall meet annually with the Brock Associate Vice-President, Information Technology, to discuss concerns of computing infrastructure at Brock.

SHARCNet site leader

Brock's designated SHARCNet site leader,

1. shall be chosen annually from among the Executive Committee;
2. will assume necessary duties to represent Brock within that organization.

The Executive Committee

There shall be an Executive Committee of BISC which shall normally meet at least twice a year.

Membership

The membership of the Executive Committee shall consist of

1. the Director, ex officio (in the chair);
2. the SHARCNet site leader, ex officio;
3. one additional faculty or staff representative.
4. one additional student representative.

The membership of the Executive Committee shall be chosen from the broader Membership by vote of the current Membership.

The Executive Committee is responsible for

1. the day-to-day administration and activities of BISC including the development of the research program;
2. funding initiatives to be undertaken by BISC;
3. the appointment of support staff to BISC in accordance with funding and with the procedures approved by the Executive Committee;
4. reviewing the progress of research projects undertaken by BISC;
5. monitoring the allocation of discretionary funds and issues relating to the financial management of BISC.

Members of the Executive Committee shall have a term limit of three years, with preferably staggered terms.

BISC/SHARCNet support

In partnership with SHARCNet, BISC shall seek to secure funds for the continuation of a position for SHARCNet and HPC user support.

The responsibilities for a SHARCNet support person will be

1. provide broad high-performance computing user support, tools, and training for users, scientific researchers, and programmers;
2. provide programming and consulting support to build expertise in the use of SHARCNet facilities
3. act as the primary source of HPC expertise for SHARCNet at Brock;
4. provide comprehensive and precise reporting as well as analysis of user needs and trends;
5. help to develop customized software tools to satisfy user and staff needs;
6. help maintain the software environment on the SHARCNET facilities;
7. assist users with the use of the local SHARCNet video conferencing room;
8. perform occasional hardware maintenance to local systems with assistance from remote SHARCNet staff as needed;
9. develop as needed and maintain local site-specific documentation at Brock.