Numerical investigation on optimizing the high performance computing resources required for finite element analysis*

  In this investigation, finite element analysis is performed to analyze the fluid flow over macro and micro structures. Series of simulations are performed on Stampede2 Knights Landing (KNL) and Skylake (SKX) compute nodes at TACC. Ls –Dyna is used to generate and solve the grids. This study focuses on investigating and modelling a mathematical equation to choose the optimized number of processors to run various grids structure on complex geometries. Two different geometries were considered; belly-flap of blended wing body and a flexible thin optical wire of diameter 5 microns. Three different sizes of structured and unstructured grids (coarse, medium and fine) are generated on both the geometries.  The numerical equations for optimized computing time is calculated based on the geometry, grid size, viscous layers, flow speed, KNL, and SKX compute nodes. This study also attempts to model the relation between the processor's clock rate to the number of grid elements (KNL processors clock rate is 1.4GHz whereas SKX processors clock rate is 2.1GHz). The ultimate goal of this research is to give an insight on how to optimize the usage of high performance computing clusters which will, in turn, save the computing cost, time and resources.