HPC in global geodynamics: Advances in normal-mode analytical modeling

Analytical models based on normal-mode theory have been suc-
cessfully employed for decades in the modeling of global response of the Earth to
seismic dislocations, postglacial rebound and wave propagation. Despite their lim-
ited capabilities with respect to fully numerical approaches, they are yet a valuable
modeling tool, for instance in benchmarking applications or when automated pro-
cedures have to be implemented, as in massive inversion problems when a large
number of forward models have to be solved. The availability of high-performance
computer systems ignited new applications for analytical modeling, allowing to re-
move limiting approximations and to carry out extensive simulations on large global
datasets.