(271a) From Mfix to Ccsi to Exa: A Retrospective on the Career of Madhava Syamlal

Madhava (Syam) Syamlal began his career as a contractor for the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL), and in 2021 he retired as NETL’s Senior Fellow for Computational Science and Engineering, the highest technical position within the laboratory. Through his remarkable career, Syam led the development of MFiX, an open-source CFD code for dense, reacting multiphase systems. Over the past 26 years, MFiX has advanced the state of the art to solve challenging problems beyond capabilities of existing tools, while also serving as a foundation for advances in many commercial CFD codes. In addition, Syam has led the development of new tools and approaches that cross disciplinary boundaries, such as the linking of CFD and process simulation through the Advanced Process Engineering Co-Simulation (APECS) project. In 2010, Syam led the formation of the Carbon Capture Simulation Initiative (CCSI), a unique collaboration among national labs, universities, and industry to establish, demonstrate, and deploy new computational approaches to accelerate the deployment of carbon capture systems by reducing technical risk. The legacy of that contribution continues in CCSI² (Carbon Capture Simulation for Industry Impact), which is actively supporting multiple technology developers at the pilot scale. Most recently Syam led NETL’s activities within the Exascale Computing Project to develop a next generation version of MFiX to take full advantage of the next generation of supercomputing hardware coming online in 2022. This presentation will highlight these significant contributions of Madhava Syamlal throughout his career at NETL.