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May 07, 2008
NASA, Intel, SGI Plan to "Soup Up" Supercomputer
By Anshu Shrivastava TMCnet Contributing Editor
NASA, Intel (News - Alert) and SGI have inked an agreement with the intention of collaborating on increasing the NASA’s supercomputer performance and capacity.
As per the terms of the Space Act Agreement, the space agency will be working closely with Intel and SGI to increase computational capabilities for modeling and simulation at the NASA Advanced Supercomputing (NAS) facility at NASA’s Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.
NASA says that this collaboration builds on the 2004 deployment of Columbia, which generated a tenfold increase in supercomputing capacity for the agency, while pointing out that meeting future mission challenges will require additional computational resources to handle increasingly higher fidelity modeling and simulation.
NASA Ames, Intel and SGI are expected to work together on a project called Pleiades. This project aims to develop a computational system with a capacity of one Petaflops peak performance—1,000 trillion operations per second—by 2009 and a system with a peak performance of 10 Petaflops—10,000 trillion operations per second—by 2012.
In 2009, with the help of Pleiades project, the space agency expects to increase the computing capability 16 times and by an additional tenfold in 2012.
“Achieving such a monumental increase in performance will help fulfill NASA's increasing need for additional computing capacity and will enable us to provide the computational performance and capacity needed for future missions,” said S. Pete Worden, director at NASA’s Ames.
He also pointed out that this additional computational performance is necessary to help NASA achieve breakthrough scientific discoveries.
“These groundbreaking new systems powered by SGI and fueled by the latest multi-core Intel processors, offer a platform for new discoveries that will help us all achieve the most promising future for the human race,” said Robert "Bo" Ewald, CEO at SGI.
Systems such as Pleiades challenge the imagination, and guide exploration of Earth, space, and beyond, said Diane Bryant, vice president of Digital Enterprise Group and general manager of Server Platforms Group at Intel, noting that “As we approach performance that was once thought impossible to achieve, our eyes are opened even wider to the vast possibilities enabled by supercomputing.”
Anshu Shrivastava is a TMCnet Contributing Editor.
Don’t forget to check out TMCnet’s White Paper Library, which provides a selection of in-depth information on relevant topics affecting the IP
Communications industry. The library offers white papers, case studies and other documents which are free to registered users. Today’s featured white paper is Best Practices for Implementing a First Contact Resolution Program in the Contact Center brought to you by Enkata.
As per the terms of the Space Act Agreement, the space agency will be working closely with Intel and SGI to increase computational capabilities for modeling and simulation at the NASA Advanced Supercomputing (NAS) facility at NASA’s Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.
NASA says that this collaboration builds on the 2004 deployment of Columbia, which generated a tenfold increase in supercomputing capacity for the agency, while pointing out that meeting future mission challenges will require additional computational resources to handle increasingly higher fidelity modeling and simulation.
NASA Ames, Intel and SGI are expected to work together on a project called Pleiades. This project aims to develop a computational system with a capacity of one Petaflops peak performance—1,000 trillion operations per second—by 2009 and a system with a peak performance of 10 Petaflops—10,000 trillion operations per second—by 2012.
In 2009, with the help of Pleiades project, the space agency expects to increase the computing capability 16 times and by an additional tenfold in 2012.
“Achieving such a monumental increase in performance will help fulfill NASA's increasing need for additional computing capacity and will enable us to provide the computational performance and capacity needed for future missions,” said S. Pete Worden, director at NASA’s Ames.
He also pointed out that this additional computational performance is necessary to help NASA achieve breakthrough scientific discoveries.
“These groundbreaking new systems powered by SGI and fueled by the latest multi-core Intel processors, offer a platform for new discoveries that will help us all achieve the most promising future for the human race,” said Robert "Bo" Ewald, CEO at SGI.
Systems such as Pleiades challenge the imagination, and guide exploration of Earth, space, and beyond, said Diane Bryant, vice president of Digital Enterprise Group and general manager of Server Platforms Group at Intel, noting that “As we approach performance that was once thought impossible to achieve, our eyes are opened even wider to the vast possibilities enabled by supercomputing.”
Anshu Shrivastava is a TMCnet Contributing Editor.
Don’t forget to check out TMCnet’s White Paper Library, which provides a selection of in-depth information on relevant topics affecting the IP
Communications industry. The library offers white papers, case studies and other documents which are free to registered users. Today’s featured white paper is Best Practices for Implementing a First Contact Resolution Program in the Contact Center brought to you by Enkata.
