Professor Rudolf Berrendorf honoured for 25 years of service

Distribute loads

After studying computer science at RWTH Aachen University, Berrendorf worked for 12 years at the Central Institute for Applied Mathematics (now the Jülich Supercomputing Centre) at Forschungszentrum Jülich. There he conducted research in the field of program development and optimisation for parallel systems in the application area of High Performance Computing (HPC). Based on this work, he received his doctorate from RWTH Aachen University; the topic of his dissertation was the load distribution of work packages on large parallel computers. During his time at Jülich, he was a visiting scientist at the University of Colorado at Boulder and at Argonne National Laboratory (both USA).

Working together

In 2000, he accepted a professorship at Hochschule Bonn-Rhein-Sieg. Since then, his teaching and research areas have continued to focus on topics related to the special requirements of the efficient use of large parallel computers. In addition to load balancing issues, the range of topics includes the utilisation of data storage options with different performance characteristics, the efficient storage and parallel processing of very large, sparse matrices, as well as the special requirements of operating such large computers. The use of artificial intelligence methods, which have only become possible in their current application form through the use of parallel computers, has led to the addition of a further area of application in recent years in which corresponding issues also arise. With the WR cluster (WR = Scientific Computing), a computer network of around 80 very powerful computers, Berrendorf also makes large computing capacities available to other researchers at the university, which are actively used by working groups and individual professors at the university.

Getting new students on board

One of Berrendorf's particular concerns in teaching is the introductory phase of studies, in which he has held a first-semester course on the introduction to programming since taking up his professorship. Over the years, he has investigated several methodological approaches to tackling the special, often non-subject-related challenges of the introductory phase.

His scientific contributions have been published in over 40 articles. He has received a Best Paper Award for excellent conference contributions a total of four times, in some cases together with co-authors. He has given keynote speeches and lectures at international conferences, research institutions and companies. Berrendorf is also a Fellow and member of advisory panels.

Shaping things together

The professor has been involved in the university's self-governing bodies for many years. He was a professorial member of the Senate for ten years, a member of the Departmental Council of the Department of Computer Science for a total of 21 years (including around six years as Chairman), a member of a presidential committee, Chairman of the Master's Computer Science Examination Board for eight years, worked on the relevant committees to develop university and departmental development plans and was a member and sometimes Chairman of numerous committees.