MUSIC - MUlti-SImulation Coordinator

The INCF has engaged in the development of software that allows large scale neuron simulators to communicate during runtime. An RFC - Request For Comments - document is available and open for comments on the proposed design and prototype specifications. MUSIC (Multi-Simulation Coordinator) is a project under the INCF Program on Large-Scale Modeling of the Nervous System.

The aim of the INCF MUSIC project is to provide a standardized software interface for communication between parallel applications for large-scale modeling simulation of neural networks.                                                    

Existing and future simulators can make use of MUSIC compliant general purpose tools and participate in multi-simulations – a possibility that is particularly attractive when:

  • different parts of a complex nervous system model are optimally implemented in different simulators, which then obviously need to communicate with each other.
  • post-processing of generated data is needed, where the amounts of data are too large for intermediate storage, and hence the simulator needs to pass the data directly to the post-processing module.

In addition, such a standard interface enables straight-forward independent third-party development and community sharing of reusable and interoperable software tools for parallel processing.

In the design of the standard interface, care has also been taken to facilitate easy adaptation of existing simulators.

INCF MUSIC is scheduled for release in early 2009. In the meantime, INCF welcomes and encourages the community to comment on the proposed design and prototype specifications, formulated in the Request For Comments (RFC) document.

   INCF MUSIC
  • A standard for neural network simulator interoperability
  • Readily available open-source C/C++ API library for straight-forward adoption in new and existing tools
  • Patchbay port metaphor gives an intuitive abstraction of the underlying MPI-based communication.
  • Each simulator will be able to use its own semantics while MUSIC provides the means for the other components to access exposed data
  • Designed for easy and straight-forward adaptation in new and existing software
  • Designed to meet the requirements of large-scale, high-performance simulation environments




  
MUSIC was initiated following a recommendation from the INCF Workshop on Large-Scale Modeling and is being developed by the Computational Biology & NeuroComputing group (CBN) at the Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden, under the leadership of Örjan Ekeberg and Mikael Djurfeldt in a collaborative partnership with the INCF.

 

MUSIC poster from Neuroscience2008 [pdf]

 

Poster presented at the SfN2008 meeting in Washington DC, November 16-19, illustrating how MUSIC interconnects to NEST and MOOSE (GENESIS).

 

INCF Secretariat contact: Pontus Holm, pontus.holm@incf.org

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