Solution of Large Scale Engineering Problems Using a Loosely Coupled Array of Processors

Our interest in parallel processing systems has been motivated by the need to solve large scale computational problems occuring in theoretical chemistry, biophysics, and more recently in engineering. We have been experimenting with a loosely coupled system, that uses a master processor to control a group of independent slave processors. This architecture was designed to meet the following objectives: the initial system 1) should be classifiable as a “supercomputer”, 2) be easily extended to higher computing speeds, 3) be flexible and fault tolerant, 4) permit easy migration of large codes to parallel execution 5) be relatively inexpensive.