Jay Boisseau Jay Boisseau must have been a Boy Scout at one time. Rather than spending his days pondering the mysteries of the Universe, however, Jay explores ways to help researchers in all fields of science utilize supercomputers. Jay's interest in high performance computing started when he studied computational astrophysics, just one of the many kinds of computational science conducted using supercomputers. Computational science attempts to model nature by performing simulations on computers.
Weather prediction is an excellent example of computational science.
Climatologists understand the laws of physics, but have a difficult time in accurately predicting weather because there are so many variables such as humidity, density, pressure, velocity, direction, and time that have to be known accurately over a large area. Using a supercomputer that is able to process billions of calculations per second, scientists can solve these equations over a large number of points in a region and produce more reliable predictions. Jay's Scientific Computing Group helps researchers develop powerful simulations that will increase their knowledge and understanding. This group has seen a number of changes over the years. Their function was to be available, by phone or e-mail, to SDSC staff and users who encountered problems using SDSC resources.