CENTER FOR COMPUTATION & TECHNOLOGY

Capitol News Bureau NEW ORLEANS — University scientists on Monday began planning a regional hurricane research center that would pull together the best minds and best computers from across the state and country. The goal: earlier and more accurate computer models that forecast a hurricane’s path and effects once it makes landfall. By working together as a center, researchers from different institutions can better compete for federal grants than if they worked alone. And if the enterprise succeeds in developing better models, it could save the state millions of dollars by reducing the number of false evacuations, according to Ed Seidel, director LSU’s Center for Computation and Technology. “We can develop world-leading programs in these areas. This is especially important in coastal modeling,” Seidel said at a forum on the role higher education will play in the state’s future. The researchers — whose expertise lies in collecting, compiling and analyzing information using computers — plan to use the $40 million high-speed Internet network called the Louisiana Optical Network Initiative, now under construction. Right now researchers produce several different models: one tracking the storms, one predicting where water from the storm surge will flow, another mapping wind currents and another detailing transportation patterns. But scientists can’t yet combine them in one all-encompassing package. Generating a computer model is like completing a connect-the-dots puzzle. The more dots — or bits of data — that a puzzler has, the clearer the overall picture. The state fiber-optic cable and the super computers attached to it will allow scientists to collect and combine more information and interpret it at a speed well beyond any one institution’s current capacity, about a thousand times faster, Seidel said. The center will also look at ways these forecasts can be used to shape evacuation plans, predict hazards, such as, oil spills, and determine how to protect important information like electronic medical records. Beyond short-term hurricane prediction, Seidel said, he envisions a center that generates models of Louisiana’s wetlands to help predict which restoration methods will work. But for the center to jell, researchers must be convinced to share their data with other scientists who may be competing for the same kinds of grants. Seidel said, the center would also have to branch out beyond Louisiana’s borders to be successful. A nationwide version of LONI will connect several key research institutions across the country. “We don’t have a lot of people who have been developing these kinds of big models,” Seidel said. “Because the state has not invested in (information technology) in the past, we need some national collaborators.”