DOE Supercomputer Ranked Fastest in the World
Titan, the Department of Energy's supercomputer in Oak Ridge, Tenn., uses state-of-the-art technology to be the fastest in the world.
The Department of Energy's new Titan supercomputer has been named by TOP500 as the most powerful computer in the world. Titan is located at the U.S. Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee.
Titan puts the previous system, Jaguar, to shame with 10 times the power. It even uses technology that was developed for gaming systems such as Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 for scientific exploration. Many things will be studied and researched through this computer, including nuclear exploration, fuels, and the atmosphere.
Some of Titan's power comes from a combined usage of CPUs (central processing units) and GPUs (graphic processing units) that were first developed to create more realistic graphics for video games. The usage of CPUs and GPUs allows for lightning-speed processing.
Besides Titan, the federal government has four others ranked among 20 fastest computers in the world.