DoE announces $112 million for research on computational projects in fusion energy sciences

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DoE announces $112 million for research on computational projects in fusion energy sciences
by Staff Writers
Washington DC (SPX) Aug 15, 2023

Today, the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Office of Science (SC), announced $112 million in funding for 12 projects that focus on collaborations among fusion scientists, applied mathematicians, and computer scientists to maximize the use of high performance computing, including exascale computers.

The Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC) program pairs the Fusion Energy Sciences (FES) program with the Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR) program to explore solving complex problems through computing. Projects funded through this program will use computing resources to model plasmas, study turbulence, and use artificial intelligence to predict and solve problems like energy losses.

"This collaborative effort will advance our understanding of fusion as an energy source while utilizing the most powerful supercomputers in the world," said Jean Paul Allain, DOE Associate Director of Science for Fusion Energy Sciences. "The modeling and simulation work of these partnerships will offer insight into the multitude of physical processes that plasmas experience under extreme conditions and will also guide the design of fusion pilot plants. We are also looking forward to including efforts from inertial confinement devices and stellarators in this program."

"The SciDAC program and the FES-ASCR SciDAC partnerships have advanced scientific discovery in fusion and plasma sciences over the last two decades," said Ceren Susut, DOE Acting Associate Director of Science for Advanced Scientific and Computing Research. "The current awards leverage this past research as well as codes developed on the ASCR Exascale Computing Project to address the new and broader 2023 portfolio."

The projects were selected by competitive peer review under the DOE Funding Opportunity Announcement for Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing - FES Partnerships. Total funding is $112 million for projects lasting up to four years in duration, with $28.15 million in Fiscal Year 2023 dollars and outyear funding contingent on congressional appropriations. The list of projects and more information can be found on the Fusion Energy Sciences and Advanced Scientific Computing Research program homepages.