Feature Channels: Supercomputing

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Nuclear physics theorists have demonstrated that complex calculations run on supercomputers can accurately predict the distribution of electric charges in mesons, particles made of a quark and an antiquark. The calculations also help validate a method that will be used to make predictions for and analyze data from high-energy experiments at the future Electron-Ion Collider (EIC) at Brookhaven National Laboratory.

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An Argonne-led team developed an AI-driven multimodal framework that incorporates experimental data and text-based narratives to accelerate the design of new proteins. A finalist for the Gordon Bell Prize, the effort used five top supercomputers, including Argonne’s Aurora exascale system.

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Engineering professor Mingzhe Chen is working on several projects that could improve on our existing wireless networks. For this work, he was recently named as the Knight Foundation chair in data science and artificial intelligence.

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A multi-institutional team of researchers led by the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, or KAUST, Saudi Arabia, has been nominated for the Association for Computing Machinery’s 2024 Gordon Bell Prize for Climate Modelling.

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Science isn’t scary, but it can be spooky! For Halloween, we’re highlighting some “spooky” research that the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Science supports. In fact, the physics community celebrates Dark Matter Day on Halloween! We hope that this roundup puts you in the mood to dig a little deeper into the wonders that surround you.

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Large language models are changing the way that people create and communicate, but they can also change the way we do science. Researchers from Argonne National Laboratory hope to demystify these tools and share how they’re shaping future research.

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Researchers from the University of Washington, Seattle, or UW, and Los Alamos National Laboratory used the Summit supercomputer at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory to answer one of fission’s biggest questions: What exactly happens during the nucleus’s “neck rupture” as it splits in two?

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A difficult-to-describe nanoscale object called the magnetic skyrmion might one day yield new microelectronic devices that can do much more—for example, massive data storage—all while consuming much less power. But researchers need a more detailed understanding of skyrmions if they are ever to be used reliably in computational devices, including quantum computers. Berkeley Lab scientists led a project to make 3D X-ray images of skyrmions that can characterize or measure the orientations of spins inside the whole object.

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New research highlights the cybersecurity and privacy vulnerabilities in health care XR systems, urging a reassessment of safety measures as the technology’s use expands.

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In an Argonne-led project, researchers used X-ray microscopy to discover a ferroelectric material that tailors its response to controlled ultrafast external stimuli, such as light pulses. The material might be applicable to energy-efficient microelectronics.

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When it comes to mating, two things matter for Heliconius butterflies: the look and the smell of their potential partner. The black and orange butterflies have incredibly small brains, yet they must process both sensory inputs at the same time — which is more than current artificial intelligence (AI) technologies can achieve without significant energy consumption. To make AI as smart as the butterflies, a team of Penn State researchers has created a multi-sensory AI platform that is both more advanced and uses less energy than other AI technologies.

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Researchers at the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams reached a new milestone in isotope studies, accelerating a high-power beam of uranium ions to a record 10.4 kilowatts of continuous beam power to a target. The beam enabled scientists to produce and identify three new isotopes, gallium-88, arsenic-93, and selenium-96.

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New experimental results suggest that sprinkling boron into a tokamak could shield the wall of the fusion vessel and prevent atoms from the wall from getting into the plasma. A new computer modeling framework shows the boron powder may only need to be sprinkled from one location. The experimental results and computer modeling framework will be presented this week at the 66th Annual Meeting of the American Physical Society Division of Plasma Physics in Atlanta.

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New method for cathode preparation prevents the particle cracking that caused performance decline with cycling of sodium-ion batteries, which offer a cheaper, more abundant alternative to lithium-ion batteries.

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A team from the University of Houston found that, when they reduced estimates of atmospheric friction of storms, their predictions on PSC’s Bridges-2 improved markedly over standard storm predictions. This advancement promises better planning to lessen the effects of storms on people and possibly aid emergency storm responses.

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Over the summer, crews began the Alpine storage system, shredding over 40,000 hard drives with the help of ShredPro Secure, a local East Tennessee business. This partnership not only reduced costs and sped up the process but also established a more efficient and secure method for decommissioning large-scale computing systems in the future.

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A new toolkit helps researchers build optimal superconducting radiofrequency (SRF) cavities that form the backbone of advanced particle accelerators. The cavities’ cleanliness, shape, and roughness of their inner surfaces contribute to their efficiency. In tests of the toolkit, scientists found that smoother cavities function more efficiently.

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Deep inside what we perceive as solid matter, the landscape is anything but stationary. The interior of the building blocks of the atom’s nucleus — particles called hadrons that most of us would recognize as protons and neutrons — are made up of a seething mixture of interacting quarks and gluons, known collectively as partons. The HadStruc collaboration has now come together to map out these partons and disentangle how they interact to form hadrons. Their latest findings were recently published in the Journal of High Energy Physics.

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As high-tech companies ramp up construction of massive data centers to meet the business boom in artificial intelligence, one component is becoming an increasingly rare commodity: electricity. With decades of experience in making HPC more energy efficient, the OLCF may serve as a resource for best “bang for the buck” practices in a suddenly burgeoning industry.

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The 12th annual Argonne Training Program on Extreme-Scale Computing (ATPESC) offers intensive two-week training for next-generation scientists, computer experts, data analysts and others aiming to infuse their computing research with new vibrancy.