Towards validated multiscale simulations for fusion

Harnessing energy produced by thermonuclear fusion reactions has the potential to provide a clean and inexpensive source of energy to Earth. However, throughout the past seven decades, physicists learned that creating our very own fusion energy source is very difficult to achieve. We constructed a component-based, multiscale fusion workflow to model fusion plasma inside the core of a tokamak device. To ensure the simulation results agree with experimental values, the model needs to undergo the process of verification, validation and uncertainty quantification (VVUQ). This paper will go over the VVUQ work carried out in the multiscale fusion workflow (MFW), with the help of the EasyVVUQ software library developed by the VECMA project. In particular, similarity of distributions from simulation and experiment is explored as a validation metric. Such initial validation measures provide insights into the accuracy of the simulation results. This article is part of the theme issue 'Reliability and reproducibility in computational science: implementing verification, validation and uncertainty quantification in silico'.

VECMAtk: a scalable verification, validation and uncertainty quantification toolkit for scientific simulations

We present the VECMA toolkit (VECMAtk), a flexible software environment for single and multiscale simulations that introduces directly applicable and reusable procedures for verification, validation (V&V), sensitivity analysis (SA) and uncertainty quantication (UQ). It enables users to verify key aspects of their applications, systematically compare and validate the simulation outputs against observational or benchmark data, and run simulations conveniently on any platform from the desktop to current multi-petascale computers. In this sequel to our paper on VECMAtk which we presented last year [1] we focus on a range of functional and performance improvements that we have introduced, cover newly introduced components, and applications examples from seven different domains such as conflict modelling and environmental sciences. We also present several implemented patterns for UQ/SA and V&V, and guide the reader through one example concerning COVID-19 modelling in detail. This article is part of the theme issue 'Reliability and reproducibility in computational science: implementing verification, validation and uncertainty quantification in silico'.