ASC News
News from NNSA
NNSA awards contract for high-performance computers
October 08 ,2007
Contract highlights efforts to integrate nuclear weapons complex: The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) awarded Appro a contract to deliver the next generation of high performance computing systems to its three nuclear weapons laboratories – Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and Sandia National Laboratories. —More
Computer scientists at Lawrence Livermore assist in ground-breaking simulation of white dwarf star exploding
March 22, 2007
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory supercomputing expertise helped University of Chicago scientists take an important step toward revealing the secrets of dark energy by blowing up a white dwarf star in a three-dimensional simulation of unprecedented details. —More
NNSA Tops List of Fastest Computers in the World
November 14, 2006
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Supercomputers at the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) hold four of the top six slots on the industry-standard TOP500 list of the world’s fastest computers released today. NNSA’s computers on this year’s list are: BlueGene/L at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in first place, Red Storm at Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) in second place, ASC Purple at LLNL in fourth place, and Thunderbird at SNL in sixth place. —More
Full press release (PDF)
NNSA announces new mark for world’s fastest supercomputer
June 22, 2006
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and IBM teamed up to announce that a new mark was achieved on the world’s fastest supercomputer named BlueGene/L (BG/L). This world record for a scientific application was set by achieving a sustained performance of 207.3 trillion floating-point operations per second (teraFLOPS) on the “Qbox” computer code for conducting materials science simulations critical to national security. —More
Full press release (PDF)
NNSA Announces A New Phase of its Academic Computational Science Partnership Program
April 25, 2006
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) announced the next phase of its academic computational science program that will focus on the goal of “predictive science.”
On May 16 and 17, NNSA’s Office of Advanced Simulation and Computing (ASC) will present information on the Predictive Science Academic Alliance Program (PSAAP) to interested parties. They will focus on the science areas and application domains of particular interests to NNSA. The competition is expected to culminate with awards in place by the beginning of fiscal year 2008.
“Since the 1992 moratorium on underground nuclear testing, large-scale computational science has provided an essential methodology to the scientific discovery and understanding of physical and engineering phenomena,” said Tom D’Agostino, deputy administrator for defense programs. “ASC’s academic alliances have played an important role in developing these technologies. They have also provided valuable training opportunities for graduate students and post doctoral candidates for future employment in laboratory, academic and industrial settings.”
“Predictive science” is the application of verified and validated computational simulations to predict reactions within complex systems where routine experimental tests are not feasible. While the potential set of applications is very broad, PSAAP will focus on unclassified applications of interest to the NNSA and its laboratories - Lawrence Livermore, Los Alamos and Sandia.
“Today’s supercomputers provide us with a scale of simulation that exceeds the expertise of single disciplines,” stated Dr. Dimitri Kusnezov, director of the NNSA ASC program. “The success of our centers at Caltech, Stanford, University of Chicago, University of Illinois and University of Utah are examples of what such focused efforts can deliver. Through the PSAAP, we welcome the participation of our academic partners to help us develop the necessary, unclassified science and engineering applications and uncertainty quantification methodologies that will further establish viability of predictive science in multi-scale simulations.”
For further details on the May 2006 event and the PSAAP program, please visit: www.llnl.gov/asci/alliances/psaap.
Full press release (PDF)
June 21, 2005
Senate Report 109-084 - ENERGY AND WATER APPROPRIATIONS BILL, 2006
(Link opens report)
May 25, 2005
House Report 109-086 - ENERGY AND WATER DEVELOPMENT APPROPRIATIONS BILL, 2006 March 23, 2005
(Link opens report)
NNSA Supercomputer Breaks Computing Record: Exceeds 100 TERAFLOPS
DOE/NNSA and IBM partnership on BlueGene/L, a tool for national security
WASHINGTON, D.C. – National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) Administrator Linton F. Brooks announced today that a supercomputer developed through the Advanced Simulation and Computing program for NNSA’s Stockpile Stewardship efforts has performed 135.3 trillion floating point operations per second (teraFLOP/s) on the industry standard LINPACK benchmark, making it the fastest supercomputer in the world. By performing computations at these rates, BlueGene/L helps maintain the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile without nuclear testing.
Full press release (PDF)