ASCR Leadership Computing Challenge (ALCC) Projects at NERSC

Overview

The mission of the ASCR Leadership Computing Challenge (ALCC) is to provide an allocation program for projects of interest to the Department of Energy (DOE) with an emphasis on high-risk, high-payoff simulations in areas directly related to the DOE mission and for broadening the community of researchers capable of using leadership computing resources. 

Open to scientists from the research community in industry, academia, and national laboratories, the ALCC program allocates computational resources at ASCR’s supercomputing facilities. ASCR supercomputing facilities include NERSC at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley La and the Leadership Computing Facilities at Argonne and Oak Ridge National Laboratories. These resources represent some of the world’s fastest and most powerful supercomputers. 

The DOE Office of Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR) awards allocations of computer time through a competitive process.

Get more information about the program, including eligibility and how to apply.

Allocation Period

The ALCC year runs from July to June. This is shifted six months from the NERSC allocation cycle, so the full ALCC award for each project is allocated 50 percent in one NERSC allocation year and 50 percent in the next. Any or all of this time can be shifted from one year to the next upon request. Unused time from July through December is automatically transferred to the following year. However, ALCC awarded time does not carry over past June 30.

ALCC allocations are given in node hours. These are converted to NERSC hours. (Read more on how usage is charged at NERSC.)

Current ALCC Awardees

The ALCC program maintains a list of current awardees with project descriptions.