Supercomputers don´t exist in many countries, but Portugal already has one! On this segment of supercomputation, NASA recently made known their new supercomputer, the Aitken.
This super machine stands out by having 46 080 nuclei and computational power of 3,69 petaflops. This supercomputer will help in the mission Artemis which goal is to take humans back to the moon.
Aitken was the selected name for the new supercomputer of NASA. According to what was revealed, this machine has as base the HPE SGI 8600 system. In terms of processing, this supercomputer has 46 080 nuclei and storage that will reach 221 TB. The theoretical performance can reach 3,69 petaflops. The Aitken is installed in the Ames Investigation Center, in Silicon Valley, in the United States.
It’s also known that this super machine has a highly evolved refrigeration system and that it will count with the support of Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HP). The system’s design is modular what is, according to NASA, a guarantee for a better energy efficiency and more reduced consume.
Aitken will help in the Artemis Mission
NASA has a mission to the Moon scheduled for 2024. The Aitken will help in calculations and simulations, guaranteeing the quickest presentation of the results. According to information, this new supercomputer will be used by more than 1500 scientists and engineers that are part of the mission.
The NASA plans to come back to the Moon are traced and well defined. The North American Spatial Agency already revealed how everything will happen. In the plans that were already presented, it was revealed that the first mission Artemis will take a capsule without humans to the Moon’s Orbit as early as 2020. The second, Artemis 2, will happen in 2022 and it will repeat the trip, this time with the presence of humans.
For last, in 2024, it will be Artemis 3 time to complete the proposed mission. This will land on the Moon, completing the proposal made to come back to the Earth’s Satellite. There’s hope that on this mission there will be present, for the first time, a feminine astronaut.
Originally published in Portuguese in Pplware on the 26th of August of 2019
