Skip to content
ATC
All projects

Open-source contribution

Mesh-Oriented datABase (MOAB)

Contributions to MOAB, the mesh library that underpins how nuclear simulation codes represent and evaluate meshed geometry.

Role
Open-source contributor
Period
2024 — present
Mesh-Oriented datABase (MOAB) screenshot

The problem

Meshed geometry is the lingua franca of particle transport codes: every code that handles CAD-derived geometry eventually needs the same mesh abstraction, and each one used to roll its own.

The approach

MOAB provides that abstraction once — entities, tags, sets, and the file formats that carry them between tools. My contributions went into the parts of the library where the abstraction meets real geometry: correctness of the mesh representation and the tooling that lets users inspect and repair it.

It is the kind of project where the user is often a scientist debugging why a tallied surface is empty. A clear error or a sane default there is worth more than a new feature.

Engineering highlights

  • The layer everything else stands on

    MOAB is invisible until it breaks — and when it breaks, the failure surfaces three tools away from the cause. Work here is defensive by nature.

  • Repair over rejection

    Meshes in the wild are rarely valid. Tools that help a user fix a mesh are worth more than tools that refuse it.

At a glance

Project
Mesh-Oriented datABase
Role
Contributor

Stack

  • C++
  • HDF5
  • NetCDF