Projects


Graph Coloring in Scientific Computing

Graph coloring models of various kinds have proved to be powerful abstractions for minimizing the execution time, memory, and storage space needed in computing sparse derivative matrices using automatic differentiation. Depending on the structure of the derivative matrix of interest---whether it is Jacobian (nonsymmentric) or Hessian (symmetric)---and the specifics of the computational techniques employed, as many as five variants of coloring problems exist. Graph coloring models are also useful in discovering concurrency in parallel scientific computation; examples include iterative methods for sparse linear systems, adaptive mesh refinement, preconditioning, and sparse tiling.

CSCAPES researchers are developing novel sequential as well as parallel algorithms for a variety of coloring problems. ColPack, a software package consisting of implementations of sequential algorithms for coloring and related problems in sparse derivative computation, has been released recently. Implementations of the parallel algorithms are being deployed via Zoltan.

Representative Presentation:
   Graph Coloring in Parallel Processing and Scientific Computing
   Presented at the CSCAPES Workshop in Santa Fe, NM, in June 2008.

Project Websites:
   Coloring. See also Zoltan for parallel coloring.


Matching in Scientific Computing

Various kinds of matchings in graphs are needed in several scientific or high-performance computing contexts. Examples include sparse linear systems (numerical preprocessing and block triangular decomposition) and graph partitioning (coarsening phase of multilevel methods). Traditional matching algorithms compute optimal solutions in superlinear time, but current trends are toward algorithms that find approximate solutions faster. CSCAPES is developing parallel matching algorithms based on approximation techniques.

Representative Presentation:
   A Parallel Half-Approximation Algorithm for the Weighted Matching Problem
   Presented at a CSCAPES Seminar in Sep 2008.

Project Websites:
   Matching.


Computational Systems Biology (under construction)