ACADEMIA

TORONTO-- Platform Computing today announced that Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) has selected Platform LSF, the foundation of Platform's Grid solutions, to power its ASCI-Q (Advanced Simulation and Computing Initiative) supercomputer. LANL's ASCI-Q supercomputer currently consists of two segments, each of which consists of 1024 4-CPU HP AlphaServer ES45s. The first segment is ranked number #2 on the 2002 Top500 supercomputers listing, with a peak performance of 10 teraflops. The Q Machine is part of the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration Advanced Simulation and Computing (ASCI) program that includes the three U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) defense labs- Sandia National Labs (Albuquerque, NM), Lawrence Livermore National Lab (Livermore, CA) and Los Alamos National Lab (Los Alamos, NM). Los Alamos will use Platform LSF to harness the aggregate computing power across the supercomputer, which includes over 8000 CPUs, and to deliver the massive compute power needed to conduct predictive nuclear weapon simulations. "High-fidelity, three-dimensional computer simulations of unprecedented scale running on ASCI supercomputers such as Q are crucial to the continued certification of the nation's aging nuclear weapons stockpile in the absence of underground testing," said Jim Danneskiold of Los Alamos. "The Platform LSF deployment on LANL's ASCI Q extends our strong heritage in solving grand-challenge computing problems for various U.S. government agencies, including the U.S. Department of Defense, the Department of Energy and NASA," said Rene' Copeland, president, Platform Federal. "We expect Grid computing infrastructures to become a backbone of national defense and security in the years to come, supporting a seamless, immediate flow of information among various government agencies for optimized security operations."