Advanced search

Electrons flow through graphene at an astonishing 1 million meters per second, making it a natural for next-generation computer chips, communications equipment, and solar energy devices. However, to live up to its potential, graphene needs support. Scientists at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory are using the Cray XT™ “Jaguar” supercomputer, with a peak speed of 2.33 petaflops, for a computational study of what could be the ideal substrate for graphene – the compound boron nitride.

Simulations based around fluid dynamics offer a powerful way to study, predict, and ultimately improve the behavior of “soft matter” – materials such as paints, engine lubricants, and even that tub of ice cream in your freezer. Researchers at the University of Edinburgh’s Soft Condensed Matter Physics group are exploiting the Cray XK6™ supercomputer and Ludwig parallel computing code to accelerate their research.

The more data generated by models, the more difficult it is to quantify extreme weather events such as hurricanes and heavy precipitation. A team of researchers that includes scientists from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory are developing automated techniques to comb quickly through a climate simulation’s huge dataset and tally the weather events that spell big trouble. They are using the Cray XE6™ “Hopper” supercomputer, named after American computer scientist Grace Hopper.