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The most powerful supercomputer in the world is called Fugaku, it is in Japan Computational Science Center and has more than 7 million cores. It has just been determined by the new Top500 ranking, released this Monday, which has been developing the world ranking of these systems since the late 1980s. A quarter of a century ago, the world's most powerful supercomputer was also in Japan, it was called a numerical wind tunnel (NWT) - and its poetic name could not be more literal: it was an aerodynamic test simulator developed by Fujitsu for the Japan National Aerospace Laboratory. It was at the top of the Top500 from 1993 to 1996. "NWT was one of the first computers to use a parallel vector architecture reaching 100 Gflops with only 140 cores. Although technologically there is little similarity between NWT and Fugaku, the current machine is clearly the fruit of Fujitsu's experience in supercomputing combined with low consumption ", reasons Carlos Cordero, CTO of Fujitsu in Spain.
"Whoever does not compute, does not compete", says Mateo Valero, director of the Barcelona Supercomputing Center, headquarters of the famous MareNostrum that has maintained a place in the ranking since 2004 and in that time has multiplied its power by 300. Valero's words perfectly portray the evolution that the supercomputer sector has experienced during the last 25 years: a constant and changing competition from manufacturers, countries and research centers. "Supercomputing, along with technology inspired by quantum computing, are going to be the two workhorses in technology in the coming years. Fujitsu has an important leadership in both technologies, and given the importance that they will have in helping to solve many of the important challenges facing humanity in the coming decade are two absolutely priority lines of work and investment, "adds Cordero.
Computing and competing is not a whim, and even less now. The coronavirus crisis has made these systems a precious resource in the investigation of the disease. Valero himself confirms that the MareNostrum is already contributing its computing power to a project in which other European countries are collaborating. And on the other side of the pond, Donald Trump announced months ago that the White House will join forces with IBM, Amazon, Microsoft and Google to focus maximum computing power in the search for treatments and vaccines: 16 systems that together reach 330 petaFLOPS.
Distribution of the Top 500 by countries and manufacturers
FLOPS - floating point operations per second - are the magnitude that portrays the high performance of these computers and one of the most precious assets of any computer that wants to compete on a global scale. Although more specific rankings have emerged, such as the Green500, which takes energy cost into account, entering the illustrious Top500 is a matter of speed. "Computers are classified after running a program that involves solving a system of linear equations," Valero says. The first to finish will be the fastest in the world. Those who follow will occupy the following positions in the list, until they reach half a thousand teams.
The numerical wind tunnel reached a maximum speed of 0.17 teraFLOPS in 1995. The best Fugaku brand exceeds 415,000 TFlops and doubles those of the team that occupies the second place in the ranking, the American Summit, which had maintained the leadership during the last four editions of the ranking, published every year in November and June. "The Fugaku architecture is based on the A64FX processor. This processor, designed by Fujitsu based on the ARM v8-A architecture, is today the processor with the best performance per Watt of energy consumed and also integrates vector processing instructions and a set of instructions that dramatically accelerate training in artificial intelligence, "explains Cordero.
If the United States had put a computer in the lead, it would not have surprised anyone: it has done so during 28 of the 51 biannual Top500 editions, published over the past 25 years. China has conquered the top 11 times and Japan, 12. The other news is that the historic leader no longer has absolute dominance in the high-performance computing war. He lost it for the first time to China in June 2016 and has not recovered it since June 2017. So much so, that according to new data, the Asian giant now concentrates 45.2% of the classified teams, compared to 22.8% of Americans and the distant 5.8 of Japanese. "They have invested in buying many machines to put them at the service of researchers and companies, and in parallel, they are developing machines to compete with the United States and Japan," explains Valero. The rest of the countries share the remaining 26.2% with concentrations much lower than those of the two superpowers.
Evolution of the number of supercomputers in the Top500
For now, History still gives reason to the United States: almost half of the 25,500 supercomputers that have carved a niche in the Top500 since 1995 were in their territory, while China so far can only boast of having strained little more. 2,800 teams in the rankings published in November and June from 1995 to June 2020; And that is the second country with the most presence on a podium that completes Japan with 2,086 teams. "The United States has been very clear about this for many years. For the security of the nation, for the competitiveness of companies, you know what these guys are like, and more with the one they have now," says the director of BSC.
But the vestiges of American superiority in the computing competition do not end there. China also pales in FLOPS. According to the latest data, the United States continues to unite 25.7% of computing power, compared to 25.4% in China and the not inconsiderable 23.7% in Japan. "That is, one by one, American machines are more powerful than Chinese ones, "continues Valero. "And that doesn't mean it is because it is Chinese technology, because many of its machines still use American technology."
And Spain? Its only position won in the last ranking corresponding to the Marenostrum, is completed with the other 149 achieved in the last 25 years. "The amount is low and that really reflects that Spain does dedicate resources to supercomputing, but not to the level that other countries. And, of course, the director of the center says that we are very happy with the resources that the administrations give us" , qualifies Valero. In addition to the BSC, other institutions or companies such as the Center for Energy, Environmental and Technological Research (CIEMAT), the State Meteorological Agency (AEMET), Vodafone, Telefónica, El Corte Inglés or Carrefour appear in the history of the Top500. "A supercomputer is a very useful and necessary tool for much of the cutting edge research being done in a country. For example, personalized medicine, climate change, nanotechnology. So the more tools you have, the more groups are created around the tool and more research is done and more you can help society, "says the director of the BSC.
Equipment and manufacturers from the main countries (and Spain)
The awakening of the Chinese giants has Lenovo in the lead and its spectacular takeoff in the last 15 years is not accidental: it is a product of the company's purchase of the IBM supercomputer division. "For us, supercomputing is the spearhead of technological development. This allows us to develop new technologies that will later be transferred to general-purpose computing," explains Miguel Terol, architect of high-performance computing solutions at Lenovo EMEA. In the new ranking, 257 of the Top500 teams came from the Lenovo factory, including the MareNostrum machine.
The Chinese company, which already bought the personal computers division from IBM in 2005, literally picks up the witness of this, which during the previous decades led the ranking. Across the ring, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), also a classic Top500 leader, is preparing to resurface after completing the purchase of Cray last year. For now, Valero is not concerned about the concentration of so much computing power in so few brands: "Competition is always good, but what worries me is that Europe does not have it. The whole economic war is over 5G and artificial intelligence ... And in Europe we are orphans, "he argues. "It is good to use them per se. Because science and engineering advance. And what is good is to manufacture them, because it gives you autonomy. Not only for the applications of supercomputing, but all those of artificial intelligence, edge computing, cars freelancers, servers ... Europe must bet on chip design ".
In addition, for the director of the BSC, the time has come to pay attention to other rankings, which take more into account the sustainability of the teams. "How fast are you, but how much does your energy cost?" "Look at the fifth machine, one of the Chinese ones." Refers to the Tianhe-2A, located at the Guangzhou National Supercomputing Center. In the Green500, which measures the energy efficiency of computers ranked in the Top500, the fifth most powerful supercomputer in the world falls to 87th place. "For us, performance and sustainability are not two independent variables. There is no one without the other. So Obtaining higher performance inevitably goes through achieving greater energy efficiency, because the availability of energy resources is limited, "says Terol. In the case of Fugaku, which Cordero describes as "an extremely sustainable supercomputing system", the top spot in the Top500 becomes Green500 in a respectable ninth place as well.
Cool with hot water
Lenovo's big bet to limit the energy consumption of its equipment is called Neptune. This counterintuitive approach is supported by a hot water cooling system. "In traditional refrigeration systems we have to cool the water to low temperatures to be able to correctly refrigerate the equipment. We can put water up to 50 degrees, so the cost of refrigeration is much lower," says Terol. This is also complemented by a system for monitoring and regulating energy consumption in real time.