200px, South west view of the IWR building, located at Heidelberg's New Campus (until March 2016) The Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing (short IWR) is a scientific research institute of the

Heidelberg University } Heidelberg University, officially the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg, (german: Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg; la, Universitas Ruperto Carola Heidelbergensis) is a public university, public research university in Heidelberg, B ...

, Germany. It centralizes scientific activity and promotes research and work in

scientific computing Computational science, also known as scientific computing or scientific computation (SC), is a field in mathematics that uses advanced computing capabilities to understand and solve complex problems. It is an area of science that spans many disc ...

. Founded in 1987 by the Heidelberg University and the state of

Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg (; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million inhabitants across a ...

, IWR participates in joint project and cooperations with industry in Germany as well as abroad. As a research institute with about 380 staff, IWR is considered one of the world's largest research centers for scientific computing.

Objectives

The main objectives of the IWR are the * Mathematical Modeling and Computational Simulation of Complex Systems in Science and Technology, * Development and Use of Computer Methods and Software for Applications in Industry and Economy, * Visualization, Computer Graphics, Image Processing and the * Education in Scientific Computing. Within the ''Zukunftskonzept'' (institutional strategy) of the 2nd

German Universities Excellence Initiative The Excellence Initiative of the German Council of Science and Humanities and the German Research Foundation (DFG) aims to promote cutting-edge research and to create outstanding conditions for young scholars at universities, to deepen cooperatio ...

further research and application areas were exploited with a focus on

Digital Humanities Digital humanities (DH) is an area of scholarly activity at the intersection of computing or Information technology, digital technologies and the disciplines of the humanities. It includes the systematic use of digital resources in the humanitie ...

and

Computational archaeology Computational archaeology describes computer-based analytical methods for the study of long-term human behaviour and behavioural evolution. As with other sub-disciplines that have prefixed 'computational' to their name (e.g., computational biol ...

Graduate school

Since November 2007 the training and education of Ph.D. students at IWR is supported by the Heidelberg

Graduate School Postgraduate or graduate education refers to academic or professional degrees, certificates, diplomas, or other qualifications pursued by post-secondary students who have earned an undergraduate ( bachelor's) degree. The organization and stru ...

of Mathematical and Computational Methods for the Sciences (HGS MathComp). As part of the

, HGS MathComp is a supported institution partially established and located at IWR, in order to realize innovative concepts for a structured education of Ph.D. students in interdisciplinary research projects.

Software development

The strong focus of the IWR on applied research leads from prototype implementations to maintained software, which is available as Open Source or

Freeware Freeware is software, most often proprietary, that is distributed at no monetary cost to the end user. There is no agreed-upon set of rights, license, or EULA that defines ''freeware'' unambiguously; every publisher defines its own rules for t ...

like the * Deal.II library, * DUNE, which includes the * UG toolbox to solve

partial differential equations In mathematics, a partial differential equation (PDE) is an equation which imposes relations between the various partial derivatives of a multivariable function. The function is often thought of as an "unknown" to be solved for, similarly to ...

on unstructured meshes or the * GigaMesh Software Framework for processing high-resolution triangular meshes as well as

proprietary software Proprietary software is software that is deemed within the free and open-source software to be non-free because its creator, publisher, or other rightsholder or rightsholder partner exercises a legal monopoly afforded by modern copyright and i ...

like the * MUSCOD-II package for numerical solution of optimal control problems.

History

The initial concept of the IWR was proposed in 1985 and accepted by the University Senate two years later. After securing the necessary finances, the first parallel computer was purchased in 1989. The Graduiertenkolleg "Modellierung und Wissenschaftliches Rechnen in Mathematik und Naturwissenschaften" (Modelling and Scientific Computing in Mathematics and the Sciences) was established in 1992 and evaluated by the German Research Foundation (DFG) in 1994 and 1998. The founding director is Willi Jäger managing the IWR from 1987 until 1998. The managing director from 1999 to 2004 was professor

Jürgen Warnatz Jürgen Warnatz (31 May 1944 in Chemnitz – 22 December 2007 in Neckarsteinach) was a German physicist. Between 1999 and 2004 he served as managing director of the Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing (IWR) at Ruprecht Karls Un ...

. From 2005 to 2016 the board of directors consisted of professor

Hans Georg Bock Hans Georg Bock (born 9 May 1948) is a German university professor for mathematics and scientific computing. He has served as managing director of Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing of Heidelberg University from 2005 to 2017. Befor ...

as managing director, professor Willi Jäger, and professor Bernd Jähne. In the first quarter of 2016 all the IWR groups moved to the a new building called ''Mathematikon'' (Im Neuenheimer Feld 205), which can easily reached by public transportation and is located at the border of the campus at the Berliner Straße (main road). This enabled an optimal integration with the Faculty for Mathematics and Computer Science, which also moved into the ''Mathematikon''. Since 2017 the managing director is professor Andreas Dreuw. Michael Winckler is the administrative director of the IWR and the Heidelberg Graduate School of Mathematical and Computational Methods for the Sciences (HGS MathComp). The chairman of the HGS MathComp is professor Peter Bastian together with professor Dieter W. Hermann and professor Hans Georg Bock as deputy chairman.

External links

Interdisciplinary Center for Scientific Computing

Heidelberg Graduate School of Mathematical and Computational Methods for the Sciences

References

{{authority control 1987 establishments in Germany Computer science institutes in Germany Information technology research institutes Mathematical institutes Heidelberg University Research institutes established in 1987