The Ecosystem of Scientific Computing and Data for the Growth of a Territory
by Andrea Martini & Gianluigi Rozza
From climate to geophysics, from pharmaceuticals to genetics, from industry to medicine, to infrastructures: there are many possibilities for applying supercomputing for research, business and society. All this is available thanks to Leonardo, the new Italian supercomputer ranked fourth in the Top 500 list of the fastest computers in the world, hosted at the Bologna Technopole, and inaugurated at the end of November 2022.
It is a large-scale European infrastructure that guarantees Italy a prosperous future for developments related to supercomputing, data science, artificial intelligence and more generally the digitisation of processes, services and products. In fact, 50 percent of the computing power generated by Leonardo will be available to research institutes and Italian universities, obviously also for joint projects with the industrial world, from large companies to start-ups and small businesses, while the rest it will be used by European researchers. The project, managed by CINECA and supported by the Ministry of University and Research (MUR), the Emilia-Romagna Region and Europe has numerous partners, including SISSA of Trieste, together with the National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN).
The role of SISSA as founding partner of the Leonardo project, with a consolidated international experience in numerical simulation in materials science, applied mathematics, astrophysics and physics and chemistry of biological systems, in fact represents an important opportunity also for the regional territory. Indeed, to strengthen the central role of supercomputing in Friuli Venezia-Giulia and Triveneto is added the participation of SISSA, within the framework of the PNRR (Next Generation EU), in the national center on high performance computing, whose inauguration took place two days after the one of Leonardo, also in Bologna, which has 10 “spokes” and about fifty partners, including the CNR, SISSA, the University of Trieste and important companies, among them Fincantieri. There are many diversified initiatives in training and nurturing also a real ecosystem around scientific computing: the professional master degree in HPC (by SISSA and ICTP), the degrees in data science and scientific computing (promoted by the University of Trieste, the University of Udine and SISSA), new innovative doctorates, including the new one in data science organized by SISSA, the new data science and artificial intelligence institute created with Generali, which sees the participation of SISSA with ICTP, the University of Udine, the University of Trieste and MIB-Trieste school of management. In addition to the research and training ecosystem, another crucial element is innovation, which is essential for the growth of the territory which leverages the enhancement of research and the transfer of technology, as well as knowledge. For this purpose, we would like to mention at least two Triveneto initiatives that complete the strategy and activities already in place thanks to IP4FVG and expand further its fields of interest. The first initiative is the competence center for Industry 4.0 SMACT, involved in the control room of IP4FVG, which sees the participation of Area Science Park and LEF, as well as universities and large companies of the FVG region (Wartsila, Danieli, Electrolux, Brovedani ). SMACT is currently completing the creation of a regional Live Demo (Odyssea) distributed throughout the territory and dedicated to the optimisation of process or product by modern digital twins. The second initiative is iNEST, funded by the PNRR, Innovation Ecosystems of North-East of Italy, with the aim of creating 3 “spokes” on the regional territory (one for each university), dedicated to innovation related with industry, the territory and its infrastructures , to the sea, and, again, to emerging technologies in the field of computing, simulation, data, artificial intelligence and digitalisation, which are leading to a significant recruitment plan of additional resources for universities, as well as cascading calls for innovation projects with companies, elements at the heart of this initiative, which aims to ensure ever greater competitiveness in our area thanks to the enhancement and valorisation of research, transformed into innovation. (https://www.consorzioinest.it/)
As it can be seen, the theme of computation, completed by data science and artificial intelligence, constitutes an important structure for the development of digital twins in a paradigm where the integration between complex models and data is crucial. The hope is that all these initiatives will be fully exploited to guarantee development, cohesion, employment and competitiveness in the area and that they will contribute to consolidating a real ecosystem fostering innovation, which will strengthen the scientific system and increase the attractiveness of the area.
