European fusion computer comes to Julich
A new supercomputer will help us to understand the complex physical effects taking place inside the ITER fusion reactor. The computer known as HPC-FF will deliver computing power of about 100 teraflop/s and is optimally suited for the fusion scientists' simulation programs. The European Fusion Development Agreement (EFDA) has charged its member Forschungszentrum Jülich with constructing and operating the computer.
"We are proud that EFDA has chosen to make use of Jülich's know-how," says Prof. Achim Bachem, Chairman of the Board of Forschungszentrum Jülich. "Jülich will show what Europe can do as a supercomputing site for energy research." The concept for the supercomputer Bull HPC-FF was drawn up by the team headed by Thomas Lippert, director of the Jülich Supercomputing Centre, and optimized and implemented together with the partner companies Bull, Intel, Mellanox and ParTec. "HPC-FF will be closely coupled to the Jülich 200-teraflop system, JuRoPA, so that if required fusion researchers can access computing power totalling 300 teraflop/s," says Lippert.
"The new supercomputer in Jülich will help us to deal with the groundwork for the first fusion reactor more quickly since expensive large-scale experiments can now be complemented by intelligent and relatively cheap computer models," says Prof. Ulrich Samm, head of the Jülich nuclear fusion project. "The Jülich HPC-FF will decisively strengthen Europe's leading role in nuclear fusion research."
Fusion researchers intend to use HPC-FF's computing capacity to better understand the complex mechanisms in the fusion matter, the plasma, that reaches a temperature of 100 million degrees Celsius inside ITER. They will develop computer simulations that can reproduce important physical effects more realistically than is yet possible. Supercomputing is indispensable, for instance, for understanding the turbulent processes which determine the extraction of energy from the plasma at the material surfaces of the first wall of the burn chamber.
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