"The Vrije Universiteit Brussel has officially put the new Flemish Tier-1 supercomputer Sofia into operation. For the first time in history, the VUB will manage the Flemish supercomputer, located at the Nexus Data Center in Zellik, for the next 6 years. The investment of 8.6 million euros should help Flanders further in AI and HPC research. The Flemish government is investing €8.6 million in Sofia, which was developed by NEC. The system was selected primarily for its energy efficiency."
"The current generation of supercomputers contains many more graphics processing units than before. These are crucial for AI applications because they can perform many calculations simultaneously. The disadvantage? They require much more cooling. Simply supplying cool air and removing warm air is no longer sufficient. The Nexus data center in Zellik is designed for the liquid-cooling Sofia needs. With a Power Usage Effectiveness of approximately 1.2, Nexus is currently one of the most efficient data centers in Belgium."
Vrije Universiteit Brussel will operate the Flemish Tier-1 supercomputer Sofia at the Nexus Data Center in Zellik for a six-year period after a €8.6 million Flemish government investment. NEC developed Sofia and the system was chosen for its high computing power combined with low energy consumption. The system contains many more GPUs to support AI workloads, increasing cooling requirements and necessitating liquid cooling. Nexus supports liquid cooling and achieves a Power Usage Effectiveness of approximately 1.2. Sofia will support AI model training and diverse HPC tasks such as chemical simulations, climate and weather modeling, and infrastructure defect prediction. Operation of the Flemish supercomputer rotates among universities every six years; Ghent and Leuven managed the center previously.
Read at Techzine Global
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]