At the invitation of Dr. Ouyang Chaojun from IMHE, Prof. Liang Qiuhua from School of Civil Engineering & Geosciences, Newcastle University visited IMHE and gave a presentation titled“A High-Performance Integrated Hydrodynamic Modelling System (Hi-PIMS) and Its Application in Sustainable Management of Natural Hazards” on May 10, 2015. 

In his presentation, Prof. Liang introduced the development of a High-Performance Integrated hydrodynamic Modelling System (Hi-PIMS) to support catchment systems management and thus improve resilience to different types of natural hazards, e.g. flash floods, debris flows and landslides. Hi-PIMS includes a core component solving the 2D shallow water equations using a modern shock-capturing numerical scheme for complex surface flow hydrodynamics, as well as other modules forsediment transport and debris flow. To enable full-scale high-resolution hydrodynamic simulation of rain-runoff and other relevant processes in small and medium size catchments up to hundreds of square kilometres, Hi-PIMS harnesses the latest high-performance computing technologies including heterogeneous architectures (GPUs) and domain decomposition and decoupling techniques across multi-nodal clusters and supercomputers to substantially improve efficiency. Hi-PIMS will therefore provide the next generation of computational tool for better understanding the catchment response to extreme weather events and facilitating design of customised strategies for sustainable catchment management. 

After his presentation, Prof. Liang discussed with CAS Member Cui Peng and his teams on issues of common interest such as postgraduate education, academic exchange and future cooperation. 

Prof. Liang was an EPSRC funded DPhil research student and then a postdoctoral research assistant from 2000 to early 2006 in the Department of Engineering Science of Oxford University. He joined Newcastle in March 2006 and has since worked as lecturer, senior lecturer and professor of hydrosystems modelling. He teaches hydraulics and related topics in both undergraduate and postgraduate levels. His research has been focused on computational hydraulics and applications. He is now a member of the International Society of Offshore and Polar Engineers and a member of IAHR. He is now visiting professor of Kyoto University, Japan, Kobe University, Japan and China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research. He published more than 100 academic thesis in international professional journals, and more than 60 thesis are cited by SCI.