This week’s CFD news includes several event updates from which we infer that people are starting to think beyond our pandemic lockdown. And if you’ve ever wondered what y+ to use in your grid, Leap’s series of articles on that topic wrapped up this week. Shown here are points and facets for a race car from an article about the use of neural networks for simulations. I’m a sucker for a mesh pic.
Computing
- Pointwise published a case study with our friends at CFD Support on simulations of a marine propeller.
- From an article on the potential for neural networks to make simulation faster: “A very recent branch of the Deep-Learning research applies this concept to the processing of geometric information and was able to overcome the limitations of more classical reduced-order models.”
- Have you ever asked yourself “Should I use CFD?” this article and webinar are for you.

ADS’ Code Leo achieved a 20-300x speed-up on GPUs with OpenACC. [Does anyone have any insight on the origin of naming software as Code Something, like Code Leo, Code Saturne, etc? Does it have some significance or is it just personal preference like my desire to begin technical paper titles with a preposition?]
Events
- Two CFD workshops are scheduled to be held in conjunction with AIAA Aviation next June in Washington, DC.
- The 16th U.S. National Congress on Computational Mechanics will be held in Chicago on 25-29 July 2021.
- Unfortunately, the 2020 ASSESS Congress has been cancelled. [See you in 2021.]
- They still plan to hold SC20 (aka Supercomputing) in Atlanta this November as an in-person event.
- The conference on Numerical Geometry, Grid Generation, and Scientific Computing is going to try to be both online and live in Moscow on 25-27 November. This year’s event celebrates what would’ve been Boris Delaunay’s 130 birthday.

Simulation of a sterilization chamber from the announcement of Moebius’ availability on OnScale. Image from enterpriseai.news. See links below.
Aerodynamics and Software
- If “F-1” and “stegosaurus” don’t seem like they belong in the same sentence, read on for how a unique aerodynamic device improved airflow to the rear wing.
- Lexma’s Lattice Boltzmann solver Moebius is now available on OnScale’s cloud platform. Read the announcement here.
- Engineers from Argonne and Raytheon are working together to apply HPC and machine learning to “optimize the combustor and turbine cooling designs for modern engines.”

The LEAP Australia CFD blog concluded their 3-part series on “What y+ should I use?” with a look at how many mesh layers are required. [I’m a sucker for a mesh pic.] BTW, have you tried Pointwise’s Y+ Calculator?
Grid with a History
Not unexpected from a painter who’s also a writer, McArthur Binion‘s gridded abstractions invite deep reading. Similar to personal statements about the grid from Mark Bradford, Binion’s grids impose a sort of order on fragments of his personal history. Close inspection can reveal partial photographs of his mother or bits of his passport. And although these paintings appear from a distance to be mono- or bi-chromatic they are actually vibrant with color and often done with oil paint stick.
Binion is represented by the Kavi Gupta gallery. As is written about him, “His modus operandi is to somehow magically blend an assault of binaries into a single, unified emblem of the unique and complicated self.”
I’m a sucker for a grid pic.

McArthur Binion, DNA: Untitled: II, 2017. Image from kavigupta.com.
Bonus: ICYMI in the March/April 2020 issue of ACM Queue, here’s how to Communicate Using the Numbers 1, 2, 3, and More. A worthwhile read for anyone who has to communicate.