The US Department of Energy has announced a new supercomputer project, named "Doudna" after Nobel laureate Jennifer Doudna, a biochemist known for her work on CRISPR gene-editing technology. This supercomputer is being developed in collaboration with Dell Technologies and NVIDIA, leveraging NVIDIA's next-generation Vera Rubin platform to support large-scale high-performance computing workloads.
The Doudna supercomputer is expected to be 10 times faster than the lab's most powerful current system, making it a significant resource for training AI models and other tasks. The system will be engineered to support workloads in molecular dynamics, high-energy physics, and AI training and inference, making it a powerful tool for scientific discovery.
The supercomputer will be connected to the Energy Sciences Network (ESnet), allowing scientists to stream data seamlessly into the system from all parts of the country and analyze it in near-real time. This integration will enable researchers to tackle complex problems in fields like climate modeling, genetic research, and quantum computing.
The project highlights the US push to maintain scientific, technological, and national security leadership in AI and computing, with the DOE emphasizing the importance of AI in advancing American interests. The partnership between Dell, NVIDIA, and the DOE demonstrates a shared vision to redefine the limits of high-performance computing and drive innovation that accelerates human progress.
