National Institute for Computational Sciences, University of Tennessee | 117 followers on LinkedIn. The National Institute for Computational Sciences (NICS) at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, is one of the leading high-performance computing centers of excellence in the United States. Part of the Tickle College of Engineering (TCE), the center accomplishes its mission by facilitating transformational scientific discoveries. One of our goals is to provide scientists and researchers from around the world with leadership-class high-performance computing resources, facilities, and support.