Overview Academic Programme People Venue Registration Sponsors Contact

Overview

Welcome to the 2025 edition of the WarmWorld-ESiWACE3 Summer School, in the old town of Lauenburg near Hamburg!

The Summer School will give an insight into ICON , one of the state-of-the-art weather and climate science models. The students will learn basic meteorology concepts and will be invited to tackle code challenges using intermediate and advanced approaches from software engineering, high-performance computing and data analysis, all under the guidance of experienced lecturers from these various fields.

Important dates

  • Apr 15, 2025 – Deadline for travel grants requests
  • Apr 30, 2025 – Registration closes
  • until May 15, 2025 – Notification of acceptance
  • Jul 28 - Aug 7, 2025 – Summer School

Who can apply?

The school invites Master students and early PhD students in Computer Science, Data Science, Techno-mathematics, Applied mathematics, Meteorology, Climate Science with programming skills and an interest in Scientific Computing. We welcome applications from all countries and nationalities, especially encouraging students from Inclusiveness Target Countries (ITC) to apply.

Group work, discussions and science in general benefit from diverse teams, different backgrounds and characters. We very much hope for a diverse and vital group and lively exchange and discussions.

IF YOU HAVE ANY DOUBT OR QUESTIONS - e.g. if you would fit into this summer school, if you have enough experience or what to expect, please don’t hesitate to contact us!

Prerequisites

The participants should have at least two years of hands-on experience with C/C++/Python. They should be familiar with the following C++ programming concepts:

  • header/source/template files,
  • data and control structures,
  • multi-threading,
  • C++20 features,

as well as with basic level Python programming fundamentals:

  • data types,
  • operators and functions,
  • lists/list comprehension,
  • control structures,
  • data manipulation, retrieval and visualisation (matplotlib).

Optional knowledge of other programming languages or APIs like Fortran, MPI, OpenMP, Kokkos is beneficial, but not mandatory.

The participants should have at least B1 level of English as the content will be taught in English.

Academic Programme

Invited professors and computational scientists from partner institutions contribute to a 10-day programme of 60+ hours of lectures and hands-on exercises, covering two main themes: climate modelling and modern scientific computing, which span over a variety of topics:

  • Introduction into climate science: In a concise manner, you will learn about fundamental weather and climate concepts and processes, how these are simulated and what challenges the models face currently.

  • High-performance computing and software engineering: You will learn more about parallel programming and software development tools while interacting with Levante Supercomputer .

  • Data science: You will use the ICON model to detect meteorological events employing python-based tools to visualise them.

  • Heterogeneous computing: Having the goal to develop an application able to efficiently exploit CPU and GPU architectures of today’s supercomputers, you will use the Kokkos programming model to rewrite one of ICON’s legacy code components.

Renowned professors Florina Ciorba (University of Basel) and Ricarda Winkelmann (Max Plank Institute of Geoanthropology) will give exciting keynote talks about state-of-art research ongoing in their fields and interesting opportunities for contributions and careers.

The participants will receive a certificate containing the number of hours of lectures and hands-on exercises, along with a recommended number of credits (ECTS) for attending the school.

Programme outline

Details coming soon!

Day Content
Mon, 28 Jul Arrival
Registration
Welcome
Round table
Keynote talk, Florina Ciorba
Ice breaker
Tue, 29 Jul Intro to Levante
Intro to Climate
Climate models
ICON Scientific
Wed, 30 Jul Git
ICON Technical
Keynote talk, Ricarda Winkelmann
Thu, 31 Jul - Sat, 2 Aug ComIn and its use in event detection (lectures, exercises and presentations)
DKRZ tour
Sun, 3 Aug Day off
Mon, 4 Aug - Tue, 5 Aug Porting energy diagnostics to C++/Kokkos (lectures, exercises)
Wed, 6 Aug Porting energy diagnostics to C++/Kokkos (presentations)
Consolidating all parts
Thu, 7 Aug Consolidating all parts
Wrap up
Departure

People

Keynote speakers


Prof. Dr. Florina Ciorba is leading the High Performance Computing research group at the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at the University of Basel, Switzerland. From algorithms for static and dynamic scheduling and load balancing of scientific applications to modeling and simulation of highly adaptive energy-efficient computing systems, she advances the research in HPC with a focus on optimal use of parallel and distributed computing resources.



Prof. Dr. Ricarda Winkelmann is Founding Director at the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, specializing in the fields of climate physics, mathematics and Earth system science. Together with her team, she develops novel approaches to investigate the dynamics of the intertwined human-Earth system, providing fundamental insights into Earth system boundaries, critical thresholds, and potential intervention points to help navigate the challenges facing us in the Anthropocene.



Lecturers

Dr. Yen-Chen Chen
(TUM)
Aparna Devulapalli
(DKRZ)
Dr. Claudia Frauen
(DKRZ)
Dr. Mahnoosh Haghighatnasab
(DWD)
Dr. Tracy Kiszler
(CSC-IT)
Dr. Georgiana Mania
(DKRZ)
Dr. Pradipta Samanta
(DKRZ)
Dr. Vera Schemann
(University of Cologne)
Dr. Hauke Schmidt
(MPI-M)
Dr. Florian Ziemen
(DKRZ)

Organizing committee

  • Dr. Georgiana Mania (DKRZ)
  • Dr. Elina Plesca (MPI-M)
  • Dr. Vera Schemann (University of Cologne)
  • Dr. Jarmo Makela (CSC-IT)

Venue

We are holding our Summer School in the old city of Lauenburg, upstream of the Elbe from Hamburg. With a history spanning almost eight centuries, the town offers picturesque views on a promenade along the river Elbe, narrow streets with half-timbered houses, but also a proximity to Hamburg and its sights.

We’ll stay in a modern conference and accommodation center, Jugendherberge Lauenburg - Zündholzfabrik , built in the former match factory, located directly on the Elbe riverfront. The center offers a large range of spaces for meetings, as well as facilities such as a fitness center, free time rooms with pool table, foosball and TV, sauna, and also laundry room.

This will be an on-site event, with no possibility of remote participation.

How to get there?

Google Maps Directions from Hamburg Airport:

In brief:

From Hamburg Airport

Take S-Bahn line S1 in the direction of Wedel (sometimes Altona or Blankenese), get off at the Hamburg Central Station (around 25 min travel), then follow the instructions below.

From Hamburg Central Station

Option 1: take S-Bahn line S2 in the direction of Aumühle until Bergedorf (around 20 min travel). Switch to bus X80 in the direction Lauenburg, ZOB. Get off at Lauenburg Albinusstraße (around 40 min travel), then walk 10 min to the venue.

Option 2: take train RB31 to Lüneburg, change there to RE83 to Lübeck (1 hour travel), get off at Lauenburg (Elbe). Change to bus 338 in the direction Lauenburg, ZOB, get off at Neustadt (8 min travel), then walk a few minutes to the venue.

It is recommended to use hvv.de to plan your trip by public transportation in Hamburg/Lauenburg.

Leisure activities

You can enjoy a relaxing walk along the river or a walk through the old town in Lauenburg. Or you can spend a day in Hamburg , with its many sights, museums and boat rides. We will organize a few joint activities like barbeque evening, boardgame night or visit to Levante supercomputer in Hamburg, but the participants will also have free time at their disposal.

Registration

If you are interested in taking part in the hpc4climate Summer School, please fill in the form linked below. You will need to upload the following documents:

  • a motivation letter
  • CV
  • a support letter from a supervisor

The sponsors of the Summer School offer up to five grants of up to 500 EUR to partially cover the travel expenses. If you want to apply for a travel grant, you will need to motivate your request during the registration process.

What is included once your participation is confirmed

There is no participation fee requested from the confirmed participants. The organisers are covering the following:

  • Access to the full academic programme
  • Accommodation in double room for 10 nights (July 28 - August 7): by default, participants will be accommodated in 2-person rooms. Single rooms may be requested, but they cannot be guaranteed.
  • All meals, including breakfast, lunches, dinners and coffee breaks
  • Social activities
What is NOT included
  • Travel expenses to/from Lauenburg, Germany
  • Schengen Visa costs (if required)
  • Any cost incurred by a participant not following the official excursion or social programme
  • Single-room supplement (around 15 EUR per night)

Important dates

Registration is open until April 30, 2025. Travel grant applications are accepted until April 15, 2025.

Register here!

Sponsors

This Summer School is organised jointly by two projects:

  • The German BMBF project WarmWorld , which brings together the developers and users of the ICON model to further develop it into a refactored, portable, scalable model delivering km-scale climate projections for the next decades; and

  • the EuroHPC JU CoE ESiWACE3 , which teams up climate modelling groups and weather services with high-performance computing centres and partners from the IT industry to improve all aspects of the weather and climate modelling workflow.

Several partners from both projects are directly involved: IT Center for Science (CSC-IT) , Deutsches Klimarechenzentrum (DKRZ) , Deutscher Wetterdienst (DWD) , Technical University of Munich (TUM) , Max Planck Institute for Meteorology (MPI-M) , University of Cologne , Center for Earth System Observation and Computational Analysis (CESOC) .

Additional funding is available through a grant from the Max Planck Society