BSC-CNS Newsletter November 2021

Current trends place us in 2070 at a global warming of between 4 and 5 ºC. A major global change could stabilize warming below 1.5 ºC, considered a safety threshold. These days, when the Cliate Change Conference is being held, BSC has provided the data to simulate the different scenarios.

MareNostrum 4 offers daily forecasts to the scientific committee of the Canary Islands PEVOLCA on the movements that the emissions arising from the Cumbre Vieja volcano will have. These forecasts come from a collaboration between CSIC and BSC, and are intended to help the authorities in making decisions aimed at limiting the damage caused by the eruption.

Between October 2019 and February 2020, fires burned in Australia like never before. An international study co-led by scientists from BSC and Duke University demonstrates that some of the aerosols that fell into the Pacific Ocean triggered a widespread increase in microscopic marine algae called phytoplankton. In other words, wildfires' aerosols fertilised the ocean similarly to when nutrients are added to agricultural grounds to help vegetables grow.

This resource, called TIGER, allows an integrative exploration of the genetic expression data of pancreatic islets and that may have an effect on the development of type 2 diabetes. The characteristics of this database have been published in Cell Reports.

BSC experts collaborate in the European project called DEEP- whose aim is to deliver the programming environment for future European Exascale systems. Researchers from BSC will bring their expertise across all levels of the software stack to improve programming and efficient use of increasingly complex and heterogeneous HPC clusters, with a focus on node level.

BSC leads PIXIL, one of the projects participating in the event "Safer and more sustainable communities. Experiences of cross-border projects in the Pyrenees". The aim of the meeting was to present the tools implemented in the framework of the four cross-border projects (Spain, France, Andorra) and to debate different aspects related to the integration of the results.

The Professional College of Computer Science Education of Galicia (CPEIG) awards the Prize of the Collegiate of Honor in the "XIII Noite da Enxeñaría en Informática de Galicia" to the computer architect Mateo Valero, director of BSC, promoter of supercomputing in Spain and Europe, and one of the world's most awarded researchers in his field.

Asun Lera St.Clair, senior advisor in the Earth Sciences Department at BSC, has been appointed to the independent board of experts of the Spanish Citizen Assembly for Climate. She will advise the Spanish Government on an initiative that seeks to promote social debate on the search for solutions to the climate crisis.