Center for High-Performance Reconfigurable Computing (CHREC): A Ten-Year Odyssey

In 2007, under the auspices of the Industry/University Cooperative Research Centers (I/URC) program of the National Science Foundation, we established the Center for High-performance Reconfigurable Computing (CHREC) to facilitate scientific and engineering research in architectures, algorithms, software, services, applications, and performance optimization and evaluation for the advancement of multi-paradigm reconfigurable computing --- "reconfigurable" in both hardware or software. Each of the university sites in CHREC --- University of Pittsburgh, University of Florida, Brigham Young University, and Virginia Tech --- contributes unique expertise and capabilities for research in this critical field. Reflecting upon our ten-year odyssey with CHREC, we achieved the following successes in collaborative partnership with our CHREC members from industry and other government agencies: (1) established the nations first multidisciplinary research center in reconfigurable high-performance computing as a basis for long-term partnership and collaboration amongst industry, academe, and government; (2) directly supported the research needs of our center members in a cost-effective manner with pooled and leveraged resources and maximized synergy; (3) enhanced the educational experience for a diverse set of top-quality graduate and undergraduate students; and (4) advanced the knowledge and technologies in this field and ensured commercial relevance of the research with rapid and effective technology transfer.