Challenge sparks U.S. leadership computer plan

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Praise

The results have won Orbach and the Office of Science accolades.

At a March 2007 hearing, Rep. Dave Hobson (R-Ohio) recalled initial estimates saying the United States wouldn’t catch the Japanese lead in computing until 2010. By 2006, American computers had already more than doubled the Earth Simulator’s speed.

“This wouldn’t have happened without your vision and your persuasiveness,” Hobson told Orbach.

He added: “You've probably left a lasting position in this country that wouldn’t have been there for the future had you not come forward and said we've got to do this. … Probably 20 years from now people are going to understand what you did.”

But other countries aren’t standing still, either. Japanese research agency RIKEN, for example, wants to build a 10-petaflops computer by 2012.

To maintain the U.S. edge, DOE has launched Simulation and Modeling at the Exascale for Energy, Ecological Sustainability and Global Security. It will prepare for the advent of exaflops computers — capable of 1 quintillion calculations per second — in the next decade. A quintillion is a 1 followed by 18 zeroes.

INCITE and SciDAC will investigate ways to maximize the performance of these new, powerful computers. They’ll allow scientists to run bigger, more accurate models — and position the United States to sustain its computing leadership and economic competitiveness.

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