Aaron Black
About Aaron Black
Aaron Black is an HPC Software Architect and Manager at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, where he leads efforts to optimize thermal radiative transfer and hydrodynamics code for GPU architectures. With extensive experience in high-performance computing, he has contributed to projects for the Sierra and El Capitan supercomputers since 2006.
Work at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Aaron Black has been employed at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) since 2006. He currently holds the position of HPC Software Architect / Manager, a role he has occupied since 2014. In this capacity, he manages efforts to port thermal radiative transfer and hydrodynamics code projects to GPUs for the Sierra and El Capitan supercomputers. He leads the Advanced Architecture and Portability Specialists Team (AAPS), focusing on evolving codes for next-generation architectures. His work includes adapting simulation codes for the El Capitan supercomputer, which is set to be the first exascale system for the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA).
Education and Expertise
Aaron Black studied Computer Engineering at California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo from 1992 to 1999. He later attended California State University-Sacramento, where he pursued a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science from 2004 to 2006. He also studied for a Master's degree in Computer Science at the same institution, although he did not complete it. His technical expertise includes the use of OpenMP, CUDA, and ROCM in code development, as well as heavy use of profiling tools to optimize performance in algorithms.
Background
Before joining Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Aaron Black held various positions in the technology sector. He worked as a Quality Assurance Software Engineer at Seagate Technology from 1994 to 1997 and as a Support Technician and Web Developer at California Polytechnic State University-San Luis Obispo from 1998 to 1999. He also served as a Consultant at Booz Allen Hamilton for one year in 2003-2004 and worked as a Software Engineer at Barco from 2005 to 2006. Prior to his current managerial role, he was a Software Engineer Team Lead at LLNL from 2012 to 2014.
Achievements
Aaron Black has made significant contributions to high-performance computing (HPC) through his work at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. He assists code teams in refactoring algorithms and optimizing code infrastructure for the Sierra supercomputer, one of the fastest supercomputers globally. He is also involved in the development of a new simulation code using high order transport methods, which are advantageous for GPU mapping. His participation in the Argonne Training Program on Extreme Scale Computing (ATPESC) has further influenced his role in HPC architecture.