The Test of Time Award (ToTA) recognizes an outstanding paper that has deeply influenced the HPC discipline. It is a mark of historical impact and recognition that the paper has changed HPC trends. We are pleased to announce the selection of the SC02 paper, “An Overview of the Blue Gene/L Supercomputer” as the SC20 ToTA winner.

This work was the first peer-reviewed paper to disclose the Blue Gene/L system. For nearly a decade, the BG series won multiple TOP500 awards and Gordon Bell Prizes (including finalists) and served as a vehicle for many research publications. These papers included topics of node architectures, applications optimization, networks, system administration, fault-tolerance, power management, programming models, file systems, performance tools, and applications science. Additionally, Blue Gene/L was a precursor of the importance of energy-efficiency when it was not a recognized problem in the community, and it is now the dominant constraint for HPC architectures. This paper has had a tremendous and ongoing impact on the design of following supercomputers.

Jose Moreira was the System Software Architect for Blue Gene/L. He is currently a Distinguished Research Staff Member at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center, developing innovations for the POWER line of server processors.

Jeffrey S. Vetter continues to push the forefront of high performance computing as the Section Head for Advanced Computing System Research at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Drs. Moreira and Vetter will be presenting the work with several guest speakers joining.

View ToTA in the Schedule

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Amanda Randles, SC20 Test of Time Award Chair

SC began recognizing an outstanding paper for the prestigious Test of Time Award in 2013. Learn the requirements for nomination from SC20 Test of Time Award Chair Amanda Randles.  

Amanda Randles
SC20 Test of Time Award Chair

Q: What is the Test of Time Award, and what kind of projects should be nominated?

A: These are SC papers that have become milestones in the field. We are looking for works whose contributions end up defining and driving the research of many projects that followed. We are looking for papers that have had a significant impact either broadly in the area of supercomputing or in a specific subdomain.

Q: How do you judge the impact of the nominated papers?

A: We look at a number of factors such as breadth of influence, citation count, duration of citations (for example the 2019 winner was still getting heavily cited a decade after its publication), and general impact in HPC. We are looking for papers that have had a clear contribution such as changing HPC trends or clearly setting the path for new research. These papers must have appeared in the SC Conference Series.

Q: Are you surprised by the papers that have (and haven’t) been nominated?

A: We haven’t received any yet. From last year, I would say that some submissions that were surprising were papers on architectures that at the time may have seemed niche but when the field ended up favoring that architecture, early papers have a profound impact on the research directions.

Nominations for the Test of Time Award close on May 8. 

Nominate a paper

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Amanda Randles
SC20 Test of Time Award Chair