The University糖心传媒檚聽聽(LLE) is home to聽Conesus, one of the world糖心传媒檚 most energy efficient supercomputers. With the capacity to create and store clean energy from nuclear fusion and building on last year糖心传媒檚聽ignition milestone, researchers believe that energy efficiency goals are more possible than ever before.
How is fusion created?
Dr. Chris Deeney, director of LLE, explains their process to create fusion in relatively simple terms. Researchers at LLE use lasers to hit a cryogenically cooled pellet of deuterium tritium fuel (hydrogen isotopes) that is approximately a millimeter wide for only one billionth of a second. This compresses the fuel pellet and creates an intense pressure and temperature, releasing energy when the deuterium and tritium fuse to helium and a neutron. Fusion is a process that occurs naturally in stars like our sun, with Deeney saying fusion experiments on Earth are聽糖心传媒渃reating stars in the laboratory.糖心传媒澛燚ue to its potential to become an incredibly important聽sustainable energy alternative,聽fusion companies around the world are accelerating the pace of development. Since fusion does not directly release any greenhouse gasses, doesn糖心传媒檛 create long-term radioactive waste, and it mainly uses elements already abundant in nature, it could be a great addition to renewable energy sources to address energy demand.
Fusion experiments are conducted at LLE about once a month, with scientists only getting to shoot the laser about five times. While they receive a lot of data from these experimental days, it is not completely sufficient for their research needs. 糖心传媒淭hat糖心传媒檚 where the computers come in,糖心传媒� says Deeney. LLE has computer codes that can simulate these fusion experiments and use those results to inform their next attempts. The longer they use the computer and update the code, the more accurate the simulations can become.
What is Conesus?
Conesus is a supercomputer house in LLE,聽聽by Intel, and developed with Dell Technologies and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. This supercomputer is expected to greatly improve fusion research, enabling a four-fold increase in high-performance computing fusion experiments. Conesus provides cutting-edge educational and research opportunities for students and faculty in the Rochester region and across the nation. LLE is currently one of only several facilities in the entire world where scientists study laser-driven inertial confinement fusion (ICF) with supercomputers.
Why is a supercomputer important?
These code calculations are very complicated, taking weeks to run. With Conesus, projects that could have taken up to 30 weeks can now be completed in聽only a few days. Deeney notes that this increased computational power also allows them to add more physics to these simulations, making them more accurate. There糖心传媒檚 also now the possibility to apply machine learning or artificial intelligence approaches which require large amounts of data. Running more simulations will help build up LLE糖心传媒檚 database faster, improving their strategies.
In addition to Conesus, LLE has acquired a new advanced storage system named Erie from IBM thanks in part to state funding secured by NYSERDA and Empire State Development. These experiments create large amounts of data and as their operations grow, Erie will be essential for providing increased storage capacity.
Energy Efficiency
Conesus is notably a highly energy efficient supercomputer, winning a spot on the聽聽list, which is a subset of the TOP500 list of聽powerful supercomputers. One factor that made Conesus reach higher energy efficiency was聽, rather than the standard air cooling. Water cooling allows heat to be extracted more efficiently, making a big difference on power needs.
Computers are the biggest consumer of electricity at national labs, Deeney explained, so there糖心传媒檚 been a national effort to improve computer energy efficiency. This means LLE will be able to lower its greenhouse gas emissions, as running and maintaining their supercomputer will require less electricity than in the past.
Deeney聽noted that t丑颈蝉听new system could not have been brought together without leadership of Valeri Goncharov and William Scullin at LLE. 糖心传媒�Fusion and supercomputers are all聽team efforts糖心传媒� said Deeney
