Hypercube supercomputers

Abstract

The architecture and applications of the class of highly parallel distributed-memory multiprocessors based on the hypercube interconnection structure are surveyed. The history of hypercube computers from their conceptual origins in the 1960s to the recent introduction of commercial machines is briefly reviewed. The properties of hypercube graphs relevant to their use in supercomputers, including connectivity, routing, and embedding, are examined. The hardware and software characteristics of current hypercubes are discussed, with emphasis on the unique aspects of their operating systems and programming languages. A sample C program is presented to illustrate the single-code, multiple-data programming style typical of distributed-memory machines in general, and hypercube applications in particular. Two contrasting hypercube applications are presented and analyzed: image processing and branch-and-bound optimization. Current trends are discussed.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">&gt;</ETX>