skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: An efficient parallel algorithm for matrix-vector multiplication

Technical Report ·
DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/6519330· OSTI ID:6519330

The multiplication of a vector by a matrix is the kernel computation of many algorithms in scientific computation. A fast parallel algorithm for this calculation is therefore necessary if one is to make full use of the new generation of parallel supercomputers. This paper presents a high performance, parallel matrix-vector multiplication algorithm that is particularly well suited to hypercube multiprocessors. For an n x n matrix on p processors, the communication cost of this algorithm is O(n/[radical]p + log(p)), independent of the matrix sparsity pattern. The performance of the algorithm is demonstrated by employing it as the kernel in the well-known NAS conjugate gradient benchmark, where a run time of 6.09 seconds was observed. This is the best published performance on this benchmark achieved to date using a massively parallel supercomputer.

Research Organization:
Sandia National Lab. (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE; USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
DOE Contract Number:
AC04-76DP00789
OSTI ID:
6519330
Report Number(s):
SAND-92-2765; ON: DE93015125
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English