George Beckett

FireGrid: An e-infrastructure for next-generation emergency response support

The FireGrid project aims to harness the potential of advanced forms of computation to support the response to large-scale emergencies (with an initial focus on the response to fires in the built environment). Computational models of physical phenomena are developed, and then deployed and computed on High Performance Computing resources to infer incident conditions by assimilating live sensor data from an emergency in real time-or, in the case of predictive models, faster-than-real time. The results of these models are then interpreted by a knowledge-based reasoning scheme to provide decision support information in appropriate terms for the emergency responder. These models are accessed over a Grid from an agent-based system, of which the human responders form an integral part. This paper proposes a novel FireGrid architecture, and describes the rationale behind this architecture and the research results of its application to a large-scale fire experiment.

An Architecture for an Integrated Fire Emergency Response System for the Built Environment

FireGrid is a modern concept that aims to leverage a number of modern technologies to aid fire emergency response. In this paper we provide a brief introduction to the FireGrid project. A number of different technologies such as wireless sensor networks, grid-enabled High Performance Computing (HPC) implementation of fire models, and artificial intelligence tools need to be integrated to build up a modern fire emergency response system. We propose a system architecture that provides the framework for integration of the various technologies. We describe the components of the generic FireGrid system architecture in detail. Finally we present a small-scale demonstration experiment which has been completed to highlight the concept and application of the FireGrid system to an actual fire. Although our proposed system architecture provides a versatile framework for integration, a number of new and interesting research problems need to be solved before actual deployment of the system. We outline some of the challenges involved which require significant interdisciplinary collaborations.

QCDgrid: A Grid Resource for Quantum Chromodynamics

Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) is an application area that requires access to large supercomputing resources and generates large amounts of raw data. The UKs national lattice QCD collaboration UKQCD currently stores and requires access to around five Tbytes of data, a figure that is growing dramatically as the collaborations purpose built supercomputing system, QCDOC [P.A. Boyle, D. Chen, N.H. Christ, M. Clark, S.D. Cohen, C. Cristian, Z. Dong, A. Gara, B. Joo, C. Jung, C. Kim, L. Levkova, X. Liao, G. Liu, R.D. Mawhinney, S. Ohta, K. Petrov, T. Wettig and A. Yamaguchi, “Hardware and software status of QCDOC, arXiv: hep-lat/0309096”, Nuclear Physics. B, Proceedings Supplement, Vol. 838, pp. 129–130, 2004. See: http://www.ph.ed.ac.uk/ukqcd/community/qcdoc/; P.A. Boyle, D. Chen, N.H. Christ, M.A. Clark, S.D. Cohen, C. Cristian, Z. Dong, A. Gara, B. Joo, C. Jung, C. Kim, L.A. Levkova, X. Liao, R.D. Mawhinney, S. Ohta, K. Petrov, T. Wettig and A. Yamaguchi, “Overview of the QCDSP and QCDOC computers”, IBM Journal of Research and Development, Vol. 49, No. 2/3, p. 351, 2005] came into full production service towards the end of 2004. This data is stored on QCDgrid, a data Grid currently composed of seven storage elements at five separate UK sites.