At the invitation of NI Shidao, director of the key laboratory of dynamic and geodesy(KLDG), David Yuen, professor form the department of geology and geophysics and supercomputing center of University of Minnesota, visited WHIGG on September 5, 2011.

Prof. David Yuen delivered two scientific speeches titled” The need for very large-scale numerical simulations to spur progress in science and engineering” and “Multi-scale Tsunami simulations of the Tohoku-Oki event”. The seminar was presided by director NI, President SUN Heping and vice president WANG Yong and XIONG Xiong as well as postgraduates attended the seminar.

David Yuen introduced the catalyst effect of large-scale numerical calculation in scientific research and engineering, and the application in solving the problems of nolinear multiple scales physical problems and high resolution visualization. He presented the advantage of large-scale numerical calculation taking the example of “Adaptive Mesh Refinement” and the actualities and trends of the CPU and GPU.

David Yuen gave a detailed introduction of how to use the numerical calculation simulated the tsunami propagated process which was induced by the March 11, 2011 Japan Mw9.0 earthquake. He used the Finite volume method as well as considered the seabed terrain computed the tsunami propagate process dozens of hours after the earthquake. The simulated result matched the ocean wave height data from the buoy quite well. His research results indicated that high resolution seabed terrain data is of key importance in simulating the height of tsunami, and the land area along the shore affected the distance and area of the tsunami propagated.

During his visit, there were also some hot discusses among the scientific researchers postgraduates of the WHIGG and Prof. David Yuen.