What is a Supercomputer? What are the uses of a Supercomputer?

Last Updated on August 16, 2022 by Rashid Hassan

Forgetting how rapidly new technologies emerge is common. A little more than half a century ago, man set foot on the moon using technology that is laughably primitive in comparison to what we have today. The computing power of your phone is already millions of times greater than that used by NASA for the Apollo 11 mission in 1969.

These days, we can make sense of the world, keep track of our data, and get more done in less time than ever before with the help of powerful supercomputers. Let’s find out what the fuss is about, why supercomputers are so important, and how we can put one to good use.

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What Is a Supercomputer?

The data storage and processing capabilities of a supercomputer are comparable to those of a standard computer, but on a massive scale. A supercomputer contains many individual processing units working in concert to complete tasks a million times faster than can be achieved on a standard personal computer.

Unlike traditional computers, which were rated by their IPS (instructions per second) performance, modern supercomputers are ranked by their FLOPS (floating point operations per second) performance (floating point operations per second). When this value is high, we know that the supercomputer in question is extremely powerful.

Frontier, built by Hewlett Packard Enterprise and based in Tennessee, United States, is the fastest supercomputer in the world at the time of writing. The supercomputer’s price tag is a whopping $600 million, and each of its 74 cabinets is a hefty 8,000 pounds.

As of the year 2022, it had surpassed the previous record holder, the Japanese supercomputer Fugaku. A single exaflop, or EFLOPS, is equal to one quintillion floating point operations per second, making Frontier the first exascale supercomputer in the world.

The M1 Ultra, Apple’s most powerful chip, can reach speeds of about 21 teraflops (TFLOPS) (one trillion FLOPS). Even so, you may be surprised to learn that the Earth Simulator supercomputer, built by the Japanese tech giant NEC Corporation in 2002, was capable of speeds of around 36 teraflops.

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What Is a Supercomputer Used For?

Althoug it is easy to emulate supercomputer powers using the best VMware alternatives, a supercomputer has specific purposes.Now that we know that supercomputers are incredibly powerful, the question becomes: what do they do? In what ways might we expect to see these benefits realised? Supercomputers, then, can be put to use in any area where massive amounts of data must be processed. Some examples are as follows:

Weather Forecasting

One of the most straightforward uses for supercomputers is to make weather predictions more precise. Supercomputers improve the speed and accuracy of weather forecasting by analysing larger amounts of data and taking into account the success of previous forecasts.

Supercomputers have a secondary benefit of illuminating the impacts of climate change and pointing us toward solutions to the problem. We are aware that Microsoft is investing one billion pounds of UK government funding into constructing a supercomputer for the same goal.

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Running Simulations

To foretell the results of an action without actually carrying it out, simulations can be run. To better understand atmospheric drag and develop more aerodynamic designs, for instance, aircraft simulations can be run. When this is implemented, planes become safer and use less fuel.

Simulating nuclear explosions and conducting experiments and demonstrations for the military are two more instances in point. Performing the same kinds of tests that can be done in a simulation would require much more expensive real-world hardware. Of course, Farming Simulator is an example of simulation but not using a Supercomputer.

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Scientific Research

Researchers in the scientific community often deal with massive amounts of data, and the rapid processing power of modern supercomputers makes their work much simpler. In 2020, when a pandemic of COVID-19 was occurring, IBM’s supercomputer Summit assisted in the fight against the virus by enabling researchers to “run very large numbers of calculations in epidemiology, bioinformatics, and molecular modelling.”

NASA researchers can use supercomputers for a variety of other purposes, including “simulating the movements of air masses and water around the planet to study Earth’s climate, hunting for exoplanets, studying the behaviour of black holes, or designing aeronautic or aerospace vehicles.”

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A Super Computer In Your Pocket

Moore’s Law is probably well-known to you. It claims that computer processing speeds double every two years, leading to exponential growth in processing power that enables us to accomplish ever-greater challenges.

Virtual reality, cloud gaming, the metaverse, and many more were just figments of the minds of experts and geeks a decade ago.

With today’s increasingly sophisticated machinery, we are well on our way to making all of this a reality. Technology has advanced to the point where even novices can benefit from it. Eventually, you’ll come to rely on it.

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