Why Modeling and Simulation (Mod/Sim)?
Modeling is a fundamental and quantitative way to understand complex systems and phenomena. Simulation is complementary to the traditional approaches of theory and experiment. Together, they (Mod/Sim) make up an approach that can deal with a wide range of physical problems, and at the same time exploit the power of large-scale computing. This paradigm is becoming increasingly widespread in a number of disciplines in science and technology, giving rise to active fields of studies such as computational physics, chemistry, mechanics, and biology, to name just a few. Through modeling and simulation one can readily cross over from one discipline to another, which is to say that the basic concepts and techniques one learns are applicable to problems seemingly very different at the surface.
