The advantages demonstrated by grid-computing infrastructures and complex problem solving environments are fundamental in terms of raw computing power and massive storage media. Indeed, they allow parallel and distributed computing of demanding applications that can now be deployed on thousands of connected processors and they can connect petabytes of data through tens gigabits/sec networks at affordable cost.

So far, however, there seems to be some reluctance from the industry to use these environments because they require expertise in the computer science field which is currently not yet widely available on the job market. Users have become in the last decade experts in the manipulation of Web browsers to access inter-continental mass of data and execute remotely located pieces of code transparently. Unfortunately, grid computing environments are still far from providing these seamless and flexible interfaces. New concepts and interfaces are therefore required to alleviate these shortcomings.

Supersonic wing profile optimisation by project OPALE.

One approach that is currently being explored by the OPALE project is the definition of virtual computing infrastructures by which users will be able to define their specific computing environment and use it with their own ad-hoc procedures. This requires the design and implementation of powerful middleware services implemented on top of existing grid environments. The goal is to provide standardised services and the corresponding procedures to help the users specify the resources and computing environment they need to run the complex (and soon, multidisciplinary) applications they currently execute. This implies the design of generic graphic problem solving interfaces, of the implementation of enabling middleware and of ad-hoc interfaces on top of existing grid environments. An international consortium has been set up on this subject, including twelve corporate and academic research institutions, as well as industry partners from Italy, Great Britain, Greece, Cyprus and France. The Opale project is one of the founding members of this consortium.

The CAST platform has also been ported on the Sophia Antipolis cluster and several other Linux workstations in Grenoble with the purpose of developing a grid computing environment for biomedical applications with A. Habbal in Sophia Antipolis. An anti-angiogenesis simulation has thus been parallelised by Jean Arnaud and is being ported on this grid computing environment.

Aerodynamics wing optimization tesbed using genetic algorithms.

The main contributions concerning the software platform CAST are twofold :

• first, a technical collaboration within the project has been setup for the development of a distributed computing environment for the deployment of parallel applications concerning the modelling of anti-angiogenesis for solid tumors, based on a Nash equilibrium between antagonistic actors;

• second, a cooperation has been setup with CNES for the design, implementation and deployment of Grid-based Virtual Computing Environments.

The first aspect implied the parallelisation of the original code using MPI and the use of the PC-clusters and other various Linux workstations at INRIA Sophia Antipolis and Grenoble. This work was implemented by Jean Arnaud. It also resulted in the deployment of the CAST distributed software platform on this environment.

The second aspect concerning Virtual Computing Environments resulted in the setup of an industrial collaboration with CNES for the design of seamless application design interfaces on the Grid.

Further, strong implication in European Networks, e.g., Promuval, led us to specify with European aircraft manufacturers and research centers the characteristics of a software integration platform for multidisciplinary code validation and verification in aeronautics. A demonstator of this platform is currently being designed in cooperation with Alenia Aeronautica (Italy) and Cenaero (Belgium).

  CAST user interface: the aerodynamics wing optimization workflow on the VTHD grid.