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From: mailcom!postmaster@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Bernard Aboba)
Newsgroups: comp.parallel
Subject: Parallelization and Monte Carlo Simulation
Message-ID: <2799@hubcap.UUCP>
Date: 22 Aug 88 12:46:38 GMT
Sender: fpst@hubcap.UUCP
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Approved: parallel@hubcap.clemson.edu

My field is Petroleum Reservoir Simulation, and I've become interested 
lately in approaching things from a completely new angle.  Most 
simulators are currently finite difference based, with second generation 
codes being vectorized.  The problem with this is that this approach 
cannot benefit from massive parallelization, in addition to the fact that 
it cannot take into account the statistical variation of geologic media 
very well; it can be shown that the classical diffusion equation approach 
cannot be matched to field data without allowing the diffusion 
coefficient to be a function of time, for example.  
The monte carlo approach has the potential for better dealing with the 
physics AND the ability to be amenable to massive parallelization.  

[
  Monte Carlo is heavily used by the physicists already.  Contact
  folks at Argonne and OakRidge.

  For OakRidge, try Chris Bottcher oakridge cby%ornlstc@relay.cs.net
  or Mike Strayer mys%ornlstc@relay.cs.net.  They're working on
  this directly.

  Try John Kogut at Univ of Ill (don't have id) as well.

 ---- Steve
]