Supercomputers – Introduction, Details & Examples

Welcome to the fascinating world of supercomputers! These are not your everyday desktops or laptops, rather, they are the Herculean powerhouses of the computing world. Designed to perform complex simulations, crunch massive databases, and solve intricate algorithms, supercomputers power some of the most demanding tasks that push the boundaries of what’s possible in science, engineering, and technology. So, let’s dive in and explore details about supercomputers and some examples of their awe-inspiring capabilities.

1. What is a Supercomputer?

A supercomputer, in the simplest terms, is a computer that performs at or near the highest operational rate for computers. These technological beasts excel in processing speed and computational capacity, often running billions or even trillions of calculations per second! Moreover, they also possess an incredibly high level of memory and storage. Supercomputers are not standalone devices but, in fact, comprise thousands of interconnected processors working in tandem. This parallel processing ability enables them to handle massive amounts of data and perform complex tasks that would be beyond the capabilities of regular computers. Key sectors such as weather forecasting, climate research, oil and gas exploration, molecular modeling, and cryptanalysis heavily rely on these computational giants.

Super Computers are the fastest computers we know of. They are characterized by very high computational speeds and an immense number of processors. They are usually owned by countries or corporations and never for personal use. In fact, a supercomputer can fill a big room.

2. How do They Build Them?

Our normal computers have a single processor with multiple cores. Supercomputers are designed with a large number of processors.

Let’s consider a team that wants to build a supercomputer.

1. First, they have to choose the types of processors they want to use. The processor manufacturers are no strangers, Intel, AMD, or Nvidia.

2. The team also chooses the amount of RAM they have to use.

3. Now the processors and RAM are inserted into nodes. A node may contain different types of processors. The type and number of processors, and the amount of RAM is design dependent.

4. These nodes are interconnected forming a Blade.

5. Now the blades themselves are interconnected and stacked up in Racks (Cabinets). Each Rack maybe a size of a large refrigerator.

6. Now, a number of these Racks are interconnected in a room, forming the processing component of a supercomputer.

7. A display might be attached, but a lot of other computers or dummy terminals are also attached to the supercomputer.

8. Every supercomputer runs a specially tailored OS for its specific needs. Now, Linux is used in most supercomputers.

3. How Fast Are They?

Just like we measure the speed of a car in kilometers per hour (kmph), we measure speed of supercomputers in FLOPS or Floating-point Operations Per Second. Simply, floating point operations means computations that involve very large decimal numbers, usually 300 digits in a single number.

So FLOPS measures the number of ‘floating point instructions’ a supercomputer can perform or complete in one second. But FLOPS is a basic unit, just like bytes is a basic unit of memory. We use gigabyte(GB), terabyte(TB) or even petabyte(PB) to indicate memory size. We use petaFLOPS to measure the speed of the present supercomputers.

A petaFLOPS means one quadrillion operations per second.

A quadrillion is 1 followed by 15 zeros.

Let’s see the 10 fastest Supercomputers in the world. (Nov 2012)

Rank	Name	petaFLOPS (rmax)	Country
1	Titan	17.59	USA
2	Sequoia	16.33	USA
3	K Computer	10.51	Japan
4	Mira	8.16	USA
5	JUQUEEN	4.14	Germany
6	SuperMUC	2.89	Germany
7	Stampede	2.66	USA
8	Tianhe – 1A	2.57	China
9	Fermi	1.72	Italy
10	DARPA Trial Subset	1.51	USA

4. Why Supercomputers?

Supercomputers are indispensable in today’s data-driven world. With their unparalleled processing speed and computational capacity, they can tackle problems ordinary computers could only dream of. For instance, they’re crucial in climate science, where they simulate and predict weather patterns, helping us prepare for extreme weather events and understand the impacts of climate change. In the realm of health and medicine, supercomputers are used to model and analyze complex biological systems, accelerating drug discovery and disease research. In astrophysics, they simulate celestial events and help us explore the universe without leaving our planet. In essence, supercomputers are the workhorses behind many scientific discoveries and technological advancements, making them an essential tool in various fields.

The following tasks require a supercomputer:

• problems including quantum physics
• weather forecasting
• climate research
• oil and gas exploration
• molecular modeling
• physical simulations

The above tasks are so computationally intensive it’s practically impossible to complete them using normal computers.

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5. Supercomputers in Action

Supercomputers, with their extraordinary processing capabilities, enable us to solve complex scientific problems, run simulations on a grand scale, and process massive amounts of data in a blink. Their role in simulating natural phenomena is pivotal in sectors like meteorology and seismology, where they can anticipate weather conditions and seismic activities, respectively, with a high degree of accuracy. In the healthcare sector, supercomputers aid in the analysis of genetic data and protein folding to expedite the development of new drugs. They also play a significant role in the financial sector for high-speed trading, risk management, and fraud detection. Additionally, in the field of entertainment, supercomputers contribute to the creation of stunning visual effects and lifelike animations in films and video games. In essence, the capabilities of supercomputers span across various fields, transforming the way we understand and interact with the world around us. Supercomputers are being used in the most unique ways. They are mostly concentrating on the key issues on technology, medicine, defense equipments etc. Let’s see some of the supercomputers in action.

Titan

Titan, once recognized as the world’s most powerful supercomputer, is an exemplary representation of the prowess of supercomputing. Located at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in the United States, Titan was at the forefront of handling complex calculations for a wide array of scientific research. With a staggering capacity of 17.59 petaflops (quadrillions of calculations per second), Titan was instrumental in areas such as climate science, nuclear energy, and astrophysics. This supercomputer was particularly noted for its role in advanced materials research and biofuel development, underscoring the multifaceted applications of supercomputing in shaping our future. The fastest supercomputer in the world is used to study alternative energy resources and climate change simulations globally.

Sequoia

Another remarkable example of supercomputing power is Sequoia. Housed at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the United States, Sequoia was, for a time, the world’s fastest supercomputer. With its peak performance reaching 20.13 petaflops, it outperformed its contemporaries in the realm of computational power. Sequoia’s processing capacity has been instrumental in conducting simulations for nuclear weapons testing, thus playing a crucial role in maintaining national security without the need for underground testing. Besides, it also contributes to fields like astronomy, energy, and climate modeling, further proving its versatility and the broad spectrum of supercomputer applications. This one’s a lifesaver. USA doesn’t have to actually conduct nuclear tests anymore, Sequoia simulates them. This one makes sure that the nuclear weapons are ready for action at any time of the day.

K Computer

The K Computer, a Japanese supercomputer, is yet another marvel in this arena. Housed at the RIKEN Advanced Institute for Computational Science in Kobe, Japan, the K Computer was once considered the world’s most powerful supercomputer. It boasts an impressive performance of over 10 petaflops, a feat achieved through its more than 80,000 computer nodes. The K Computer has made significant contributions to scientific research fields, including disaster prevention, medicine, and meteorology. Notably, it played a vital role in predicting the behavior of radioactive spread during the Fukushima nuclear disaster, proving the substantial real-world impacts of supercomputing.
It works on atom and electron simulations useful for solar cells, effects of tsunami on buildings, building better structures in earthquake-prone zones. It is also used for pharmaceutical research and semiconductor technology.

IBM Mira

Our exploration of supercomputing power would be incomplete without mentioning IBM Mira, one of the top-ranking supercomputers globally. Mira, which is housed at the Argonne National Laboratory in the United States, boasts a peak performance of 10 petaflops, thanks to its half a million processing cores. Mira has a strong affiliation with a multitude of research domains, including materials science, climatology, and biomedical science. Its sheer computational power has been harnessed to simulate and study complex systems and phenomena, from the dynamics of supernovas to the intricate behavior of protein folding. By providing scientists with a powerful tool for high-resolution modeling and simulation, Mira continues to push the boundaries of what’s possible in scientific research, exemplifying the transformative potential of supercomputing. Mira by IBM, simulates the evolution of the Universe. It also runs the climate change scenarios and helps in research of more efficient car batteries.

Tianhe-1A

The Tianhe-1A supercomputer, a technological marvel from China, deserves a special mention in this discussion. Situated at the National Supercomputing Center in Tianjin, it was declared the world’s fastest supercomputer in 2010. With a peak computational speed of 2.57 petaflops, it eclipsed the performance of all existing supercomputers at the time. Tianhe-1A’s computing prowess stems from its 14,336 Intel Xeon processors and 7,168 Nvidia Tesla M2050 GPUs. A broad spectrum of research fields, such as petroleum exploration and aircraft design, have been revolutionized by its computational capabilities. The Tianhe-1A exemplifies China’s ascending influence in the realm of supercomputing, marking a significant milestone in global technological advancement. Tianhe-1A,  appropriately translated means ‘Milky Way – Number One’.  When it was introduced, it is the fastest supercomputer in the world. Aptly for its name, it is used for studying the formation of galaxies in the Universe. Also it helps in the research in hurricane and tsunami modeling, cancer research, and drug discovery.

Watson (IBM)

IBM’s Watson is another noteworthy supercomputer that stands out in the realm of artificial intelligence. Launched in 2011, Watson gained global recognition for its impressive victory in the game show Jeopardy!, where it competed against the show’s previous champions. Watson’s computing prowess can be attributed to its 90 IBM Power 750 servers, 16 Terabytes of RAM, and sophisticated algorithms for natural language processing. It is designed to handle complex queries and understand human language, which sets it apart from traditional supercomputers. Watson’s capabilities are not confined to game shows, as it has made significant contributions to various fields including healthcare, finance, and weather forecasting. IBM’s Watson showcases how supercomputers are transitioning from sheer computational power towards more intelligent and context-aware computing. Watson, IBM’s very own supercomputer is used in Cancer in a collaboration with Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. Watson can process and understand natural language, language that we speak. So it can easily manage all the research data available and suggest relevant material to a particular researcher.

What Watson can do is read and understand huge volumes of information. There is so much information being developed in health care in general, and oncology in particular, that the ability to understand all the information out there is becoming progressively more challenging. What Watson does is bring information to the doctor. [Dr. Martin Khon, Chief Medical Scientist, IBM]

6. Supercomputers in India

• India has 9 supercomputers.
• Notable one’s – SAGA-220, EKA, Virgo, PARAM Yuva, Prithivi and the latest PARAM Yuva-II.
• In 2007, EKA was the worlds 4th fastest according to TOP500.
• The fastest supercomputer from India that is listed in TOP500 is located at ‘Center for Mathematical Modeling and Computer Simulation’. It is not named.
• Later India developed PARAM Yuva II on February 8, 2013. Now it is the fastest supercomputer in India.
• By 2017, India plans to build the fastest supercomputer in the world.

7. Supercomputer Facts

• TOP500 is a project that lists and details the fastest 500 supercomputers in the world.
• World’s first supercomputer is CDC 6600 by Cray.
• The fastest supercomputer is Titan. (TOP500)
• At least 50% of TOP500 are from USA.
• Almost 74% use Intel Xenon architecture for processors.
• Most of them use water coolant systems.

Conclusion

The number of supercomputers in the world increases rapidly. They are sometimes seen as an indication of a country’s technological advancement and surely they are. There is an estimation that in future, personal computers can run 10 times more faster than today’s supercomputers. But a new technology, Exascale computing which would make supercomputers run a 1000 times faster than their present counterparts.

Our quest of faster and more efficient computers is insatiable. We will keep on building systems that are better than the last one. Maybe some day we can build the kind of supercomputers that will simulate the human brain. That would be the holy grail of Artificial Intelligence. And our scientists say that it is not so far.

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