A Chinese supercomputer has been ranked the world’s second-fastest machine, surpassing European and Japanese systems and underscoring China’s aggressive commitment to science and technology.
The Dawning Nebulae, based at the National Supercomputing Center in Shenzhen, has achieved a sustained computing speed of 1.27 petaflops — the equivalent of one thousand trillion mathematical operations a second — in the latest semi-annual ranking of the world’s fastest 500 computers.
The newest ranking was made public on Monday at the International Supercomputer Conference in Hamburg, Germany. Supercomputers are used for scientific and engineering problems ranging from climate simulation to automotive design.
The Chinese machine is actually now ranked as the world’s fastest in terms of theoretical peak performance, but that is considered a less significant measure than the computing speed achieved on a standardized computing test.
The world’s fastest computer remains the Cray Jaguar supercomputer at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. In November it was measured at 1.75 petaflops.
In the previous year’s ranking, the Chinese had the fifth-fastest computer, a system that was based at a National Supercomputing Center in Tianjin. That machine has dropped to seventh place.
The US continues to be the dominant maker of supercomputers, and is the nation with the most machines in the top 500. The US has 282 of the world’s fastest 500 computers on the new list, an increase from 277 when the rankings were compiled in November and 55.4 percent of installed performance.
Boosted by Nebulae’s performance, China rose to No. 2 overall, with 24 of the systems on the list and 9.2 percent of global supercomputing capacity, up from 21 systems six months ago.
Europe had 144 systems on the list, including 38 in Britain, 29 in France and 24 in Germany. Japan had 18 supercomputers on the list, up from 16 six months ago, and India had five.
The Nebulae reflects China’s continued reliance on foreign know-how. It was built by Dawning Information Industry but uses processors from Intel and Nvidia.
China, however, appears intent on challenging US dominance.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if by the end of this year they surpass the scientific computing power of the EU countries combined and have a computer system with an achieved performance to reach the No. 1 position on the top 500,” said Jack Dongarra, a computer scientist at the University of Tennessee and one of the researchers who has organized the twice-yearly rankings.
Americans designed the first machines that were defined as supercomputers during the 1960s, and the US has rarely been dislodged from its controlling position as technology leader. In 2002 the Japanese government’s Earth Simulator set off anxiety in Washington when that system briefly claimed the position.
The US then began investing heavily in the computing systems, breaking the petaflop barrier in 2008. It is preparing for a sustained push to build systems capable of computing at what is known as exascale performance — 1,000 times faster than today’s fastest systems. The goal is to reach that technological achievement by 2020.
Through the noise of rushing papers and whirring belts at a print factory in Kyoto, two creators watch their photo essay come to life in broadsheet form — part of an effort to win new audiences in the age of artificial intelligence (AI). Despite the decline of the publishing industry, self-publication and handmade “zine” magazines are growing in popularity in Japan, reflecting the nation’s enduring love of paper in the digital era. While speaking to Agence France-Presse at the plant, his hands black with ink, one of the creators, Kazuma Obara, said: “I think [paper] is a medium that engages all five
‘ABSURD MISTAKE’: The election commission said that there had been a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations ran short of ballot papers South Korean riot police yesterday cleared protesters from a Seoul polling station after a 35-hour blockade sparked by a shortage of ballot papers during local elections earlier this week. Wednesday’s election was the first nationwide vote since South Korean President Lee Jae-myung took office following the ouster of Yoon Suk-yeol over his short-lived martial law declaration. Lee’s ruling Democratic Party swept most races, but failed to flip the crucial Seoul mayoral seat. The South Korean National Election Commission apologized, blaming a failure to anticipate turnout after 14 polling stations in Seoul ran short of ballot papers. Some polling stations stayed open until 10pm to
Australian researchers have trained lab-grown brain cells on a silicon computer chip to play the 1990s shooter game Doom and said they are just scratching the surface of what the neurons could be capable of doing. It is the science-fiction work of biotech boffins at Cortical Labs, who researched and developed the technology that harnesses the workings of the brain’s networking system. Each so-called “biological computer” contains about 200,000 living human brain cells, grown from stem cells that were harvested from blood donations. Having mastered the simple computer game Pong, where a paddle is moved up and down to send a ball
France experienced its hottest spring on record, the French weather service said on Tuesday, after an exceptional early heat wave that also broke highs for the season in England and Wales. Meteo-France said the average nationwide temperature over March to May was 13.8°C — about 1.7°C above the norm, and surpassing records set in 2011 and 2020. “The warmest spring since records began in 1900,” it said in a bulletin. All three months were warmer than average, but the onset of an “unprecedented heatwave” late last month pushed the mercury to highs typically seen at the height of the summer. “Our country had never
RSS