Feeding a large-scale physics application to Python

The authors describe their experiences using Python with the SPaSM molecular dynamics code at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Originally developed as a large monolithic application for massive parallel processing systems, they have used Python to transform their application into a flexible, highly modular, and extremely powerful system for performing simulation, data analysis, and visualization. In addition, they describe how Python has solved a number of important problems related to the development, debugging, deployment, and maintenance of scientific software.