14 DAY TRIAL // Moscow State University unveiled the details of an agreement with server vendor IBM to install and deploy a Blue Gene/P supercomputing cluster. The BlueGene supercomputer will be Russia's first device of its kind in the BlueGene/P series and will be installed at the Department of Computational Mathematics and Cybernetics. The machine will be used for researching viable solutions in nanotechnology and life sciences.
"As Russia's leading academic institution, we are very proud that Moscow State University should join the ranks of the world's leading research organizations to tackle some of the most complex and computer intensive problems known to man-kind - from astrophysics, to molecular modeling," said Viktor Sadovnichiy, Rector of Moscow State University. "This agreement with IBM heralds a new era of supercomputing in Russia".
The university ordered two racks of the Blue Gene/P, powered by 8.192 processors in a small-form package. The BlueGene will be capable of executing 27.8 trillion operations per second (Teraflops) and will be 2,600 times faster that a high-end desktop PC.
The supercomputer will be listed amongst the top fifty most powerful supercomputers in the world. There are many other supercomputers on the Russian territory, but the BlueGene/P will require significantly less physical space and energy than the existing ones.
A single rack of the BlueGene/P is almost the size of a refrigerator. It consumes up to seven times less energy than any other supercomputer design. The supercomputer is designed modularly, with scalability in mind. Should the Moscow University's computational requirements grow, extra racks can be added at any time, without performing any changes to the existing design.
"IBM is working with top universities and government agencies around the world to deliver the next generation of supercomputers that combine different types of processors to increase compute power while reduce energy and space costs," said Kirill Korniliev, Country General Manager, IBM East Europe & Asia. "Our agreement with Moscow State University demonstrates not only our commitment to Russia's leading university, but to Russia's national scientific agenda."
IBM's unique dense packaging design allowed the company to lead the top 500 list of world's most powerful supercomputers. Att the same time, the BlueGene series is energy efficient, which allows the corporation to cut down the total costs of ownership (TCO).