Dresden's Capella supercomputer ranks among the fastest and most eco-friendly in the global arena.
Capella: Germany's Third Most Powerful Supercomputer
Capella, a powerful and energy-efficient supercomputer, is located in Dresden, Germany. Financed and managed by the Jülich Supercomputing Centre (JSC) of the Forschungszentrum Jülich, Capella boasts a peak performance of 38 Petaflops, equivalent to 38 billion calculations per second.
This supercomputer ranks third in terms of power in Germany, according to a list of the 500 most powerful supercomputers published by a group of experts every six months. Capella's energy efficiency also places it fifth in the Green500 list worldwide, a ranking system that measures performance efficiency in Gigaflops per Watt of consumed electrical power.
One of the primary uses for Capella is in the field of Artificial Intelligence and data analysis. The OpenGPT-X project, for instance, is an example of a use case for Capella in the field of AI and language models, specifically for European language models. In this project, Capella is used to train and improve European language models.
Capella's capabilities extend beyond AI and data analysis. In medical research, it is used to gain new insights into natural disasters and climate change from Earth observation data. Moreover, Capella is used in various application areas that require high performance and memory, including medical research, where machine learning methods are used for cancer diagnosis and the development of new medicines.
In the realm of medical research, Capella is used to develop new medicines and aid in cancer diagnosis. In Earth system science, it is used to gain new insights into natural disasters and climate change from Earth observation data.
On a more staggering scale, a human would need 1.2 billion years to perform the same calculations that Capella can do in one second. This remarkable speed and efficiency make Capella a valuable asset in many fields, from AI and data analysis to medical research and Earth system science.
In the recent November 2022 issue, the supercomputer Capella, housed at the Center for Information Services and High-Performance Computing (ZIH) of TU Dresden, ranked 51st. Despite its impressive rank, Capella continues to push the boundaries of what is possible in the realm of supercomputing, offering a glimpse into the future of high-performance computing.
