September is Scientific Supercomputing Month

NERSC's flagship Cray XE6 system is called “Hopper” in honor of American computer scientist Grace Murray Hopper.

Whether it’s building a car battery that will take you 500 miles on a single charge or understanding the impact of Earth’s changing climate on agriculture—advanced computing is a vital part of the scientific process, and R&D (research and development). 

That’s why the Department of Energy (DOE)—the nation’s largest supporter of basic energy and physical sciences research—invests in supercomputing resources to support America’s science community. These supercomputing centers house some of the most powerful computers on Earth, helping make the national laboratories unique research institutions that drive innovative research. How has this investment benefitted you? Let us count the ways!

This month, DOE is celebrating scientific supercomputing. So, over the next four Mondays, Berkeley Lab will highlight research being done at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) to design better batteries, generate more accurate climate simulations, develop clean burning combustion devices and sustainable clean-energy sources for the future. Every Thursday, we’ll take a look back at NERSC’s long history in scientific computing with photos from our archives and some fun factoids. Look for these on our Facebook page. And on Fridays, our directors will share their thoughts on the future of scientific supercomputing and networking.

As the primary scientific computing facility for DOE’s Office of Science, NERSC supports more than 5,000 scientists across the U.S. as they perform basic science research to solve some of the nation’s most pressing scientific problems. NERSC is located at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab)—the only DOE national lab that comprises the three elements required for world-class computational science: a state-of-the–art supercomputing facility (NERSC), high-speed network (ESnet) and renowned researchers.

DOE’s Energy Sciences Network (ESnet) is a dedicated “Internet for science” that allows researchers around the world to effectively and efficiently collaborate by sharing data and ideas. Berkeley Lab is also home to award-winning applied mathematicians, computational researchers and computer scientists who create the software, algorithms and hardware that make supercomputers powerful tools for discovery.