Overview

Current Master Thesis projects offered at PDC. A sample of some ongoing thesis projects and some past examples.

Suggested Master Thesis projects

Pair of condensate vortices with sg2

GPU programming with CUDA for computational astrophysics. This project is based on the use of the C CUDA sg2 code, developed by Chi-kwan Chan (Nordita), for 2D Hydro-Dynamics simulations on the PDC GPU cluster Zorn. Depending on the student background and interest, the MS project might cover purely Computer Science topics (performance analysis, code optimization, mixed CPU/GPU programming) or numerical issues (study of effect of single and double precision and the possibility of using mixed precision calculations) or the introduction of new physics capability in the code (MHD description, 3D geometry). If you are interested, please contact Stefano Markidis.
Development an implementation of an asynchronous (Event-Driven) Particle-in-Cell method. Particle-in-Cell (PIC) methods are one of the most powerful numerical techniques to model space, astrophysical and laboratory plasmas. In PIC methods, each physical particle (electron, proton, heavy ion) is represented by a computational particle moving in a self-consistent electro-magnetic field. In this project, the development and implementation of an alternative formulation of the PIC method is proposed. Instead of using the traditional time-driven approach, the event-driven technique, as suggested in this paper ("A new asynchronous methodology for modeling of physical systems: breaking the curse of Courant condition" by H. Karimabadi et al.), will be used. The student will develop and implement an asynchronous one-dimensional electrostatic PIC code in the programming language of his/her choice to study spacecraft charging. If you are interested, please contact Stefano Markidis.
Performance modeling
High Performance programming languages