STUDENT PROGRAMS
The San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) is an Organized Research Unit (ORU) of UCSD. SDSC provides high-performance supercomputing and data infrastructure to support leading-edge science and engineering research. While students do not attend regular classes at the center, they play a vital role through internships and student jobs. Many students have launched their careers through these experiences and have been important participants in groundbreaking research. In fact, qualified students can obtain their own accounts on SDSC's supercomputers, which have ranked among the largest in the nation since the center's founding.
SDSC intern Natalie Rubin's work, Following an Electron, was featured on the Discovery Channel |
Computational Research at SDSC
Students at UCSD have access to all the computational and data resources at SDSC. Beginner accounts are offered for students through the Academic Associates Program (AAP) at no charge to the student. To learn more about available resources and how to apply see Resources & Services.
UCSD's Computational Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Program
Computational science and engineering is an emerging "third branch" of research, complementing traditional experiments and theoretical approaches by harnessing the power of sophisticated models running on supercomputers to create simulations or "virtual worlds" that solve problems from climate change and drug design to exploring the formation of the universe.
UCSD has a campus-wide interdisciplinary Ph.D. program, Computational Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Graduate Program (CSME), designed to train the next generation of scientists, mathematicians, and engineers in the use of modern tools of computational science. SDSC offers guest lecturers in general parallel programming concepts and provides the use of supercomputing and data storage resources in our machine room for this program.
If you are a student in a field that combines mathematics and computer science with any of the scientific or engineering disciplines you may be eligible to apply for this specialization to your doctoral degree. A Masters Degree program will soon be offered. For more information see CSME.
Internships and Student Employment
SDSC offers year-round opportunities for students. Students have worked in numerous research groups, as help desk consultants, programmers in visualization, Web services, database management, operations and business office staff, and as science or technical writers. Research projects have ranged from earthquake simulations to internet analysis, bioinformatics, and cell modeling.
Interns participate in research programs such as the NSF-funded Cyberinfrastructure Experiences for Graduate Students which pairs students with mentors at the center who guide them during a two-month summer internship in the use of high-performance computers for their Ph.D. thesis research.
Internships and job opportunities are posted on the SDSC Careers page.
