Hardware
The center houses a state of the art computational cluster dedicated for simulation of nonlinear impact events. The cluster consists of six compute nodes with eight cores each which gives the researcher the ability to run computational jobs using 48 cores in parallel processing. The cluster has 96 GB of memory (RAM) and operates SUES Linux 11SP1 operating system using 64 bit processors. MPI libraries are available for MPP LS-DYNA parallel runs as well as PBS Pro queuing system.
The researchers use several 64-bit workstations with advanced graphics configurations for pre- and post-processing models. These workstations are also capable of running MPP LS-DYNA due to their multi-core hardware and thus will server additionally as computational resources for small to medium jobs. The cluster and the workstation are connected via a dedicated high speed fiber optic cable to enable fast data transfer among all the center computers.
Additionally, the researchers have access to A&M supercomputer resources via collaborative efforts with the faculty of the College of Engineering. The flagship High Performance Computer (HPC) at Texas A&M University is a 3,168 cores housed into 372 nodes with a total memory of 9,056 GB of RAM. The other system is the Transportation Research and Analysis Computing Center (TRACC). The TRACC computational cluster is a 128 compute nodes with eight cores and eight GB of RAM for each node.
Software
CeTCoM maintains the following industry-leading software packages for performing most of our simulation analyses.
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LS-DYNA – A general purpose multi-physics explicit and implicit finite element analysis package that is capable of analyzing non-linear dynamic response of three-dimensional structures and fluids.
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Carsim – A multi-rigid body vehicle dynamics code that predicts vehicle kinematics, forces, moments, accelerations, and handling when subjected to a wide variety of inputs such as steering, braking, throttle, roadway geometry, surface conditions, etc.
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LS-OPT, HyperStudy – Design optimization and probabilistic analysis codes that interface with LS-DYNA and other nonlinear finite element codes. They are used to evaluate a large number of parametric design variations for developing the most optimized product design.
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LS-TaSC, OptiStruct – Topology and shape optimization codes that interface with LS-DYNA and other analysis codes. They are used to optimize shapes and volumes of structures to help designers utilizes the distribution of the material in an optimum way.
In addition to the above mentioned software, we frequently use SolidWorks, HyperWorks, RapidForm, AutoCAD, Barrier VII, and HVOSM.