The research objective of this award is to identify and critically evaluate the most promising research areas and research themes in the field of simulation-based engineering and science. Ideas and data will be gathered in a workshop from some of the nation's leading researchers in the field. These will be supplemented by the results from a recently completed report from a predecessor study, which gathered similar data from 59 leading labs abroad. Deliverables include a conference proceedings report to be available as a bound volume at the meeting on April 22, an updated version posed on the Web when all presentations are finalized by the participants, a draft version of a final synthesis report of the workshop findings, and a bound volume of the final report when all editing has been completed. Both the proceedings and final report will be maintained on the Web for at least five years.
The results of this research will enable researchers and research managers to focus their efforts on the areas: (1) that need the most work to overcome barriers to progress, and (2) that offer the greatest potential for progress. This methodology is emerging as an equal partner to the long established mathematical and experimental methodologies for scientific and engineering investigation. The advent of vastly more powerful computers at affordable costs, and recent quantum improvements in software algorithms allow researchers to use simulation and modeling techniques to investigate problems that were never tractable before. New simulation techniques allow the researcher to explore situations in materials, biomedical, energy, the environment, and many other domains that offer the promise of greatly improved predictions. Examples of application areas include global warming, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcano eruptions, terrorist attacks and their aftermath, nanotechnology safety, financial crises, and many others --almost anything can be modeled and simulated with useful results. Further, this emerging discipline offers means of attracting young people into science and engineering because of its wide application to important, but easily understood, situations, its attractive visualization outputs, and its accessibility to even beginning students.
