Construction has begun near Edinburgh on the site of the UK’s most powerful computer — which is owned by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and hosted by the University of Edinburgh.
Experts are hailing the work on the national supercomputer site near Penicuik in Midlothian as a milestone moment as the UK moves a step closer to turbo-charging its capacity for research and innovation.
The national supercomputer is set to empower world-changing discoveries in globally significant fields such as aircraft engineering, extreme weather events and drug discovery for cancer.
The supercomputer – made possible by an investment of up to £750 million from the UK Government – marks a step-change in the country’s compute power and will cement the UK’s status as a leader in supercomputing, critical to driving economic growth.
“The new machine is expected to have thousands of the latest processers, allowing it to deliver at least a billion – billion calculations per second, up from the 20 million – billion calculations per second currently delivered by the current national supercomputer,” said the university.
“At around fifty times more powerful than the UK’s current national supercomputer, ARCHER2, the new system will be able to carry out incredibly complex calculations in hours rather than days, and solve much larger problems than ever before. This will help make today’s impossible calculations possible …
“ARCHER2 – also housed at the University – aided Covid-19 drug-discovery, empowered firms like Rolls Royce to improve aircraft engine efficiency and sustainability, and has enabled engineers to make wind farms more efficient.
“Supercomputing also allows researchers to model flood risks for communities, understand changes in our ocean temperatures, and simulate earthquakes – challenges that are simply unfeasible or prohibitively costly to do in the real-world.
“A recent independent report showed that ARCHER2 generated £8 per £1 invested, enabling more than £4.2bn in benefits for the UK economy.”
Professor Mark Parsons, Dean of Research Computing, said: “You would never guess from this ordinary-looking building site just how vitally important it will be for the UK and how its contents could impact on all of our lives positively.
“This marks a profound leap in compute power for the UK. The value of this supercomputer across our society is vast, and will aid strong industry, a healthier economy and a happier population.”