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From VOA Learning English, |
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this is the Technology Report. |
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China's Tianhe-2 supercomputer |
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has just been rated No. 1 on the top 500 |
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-- a respected list of the world's most powerful computers. |
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Experts measured the supercomputer's performance |
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at 33.86 petaflop or quadrillion of operations per second. |
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China's National University of Defense Technology |
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developed the supercomputer, which runs twice |
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as fast as the No.2 rated Titan supercomputer. |
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It belongs to the United States Government's |
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Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. |
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Both Tianhe-2 and Titan are part of an ongoing race |
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to make supercomputers faster and more powerful. |
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So what is a supercomputer? |
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A basic personal computer has one microchip |
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at the center of its operations. |
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This Central Processing Unit, or CPU, |
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executes a set of commands contained in a predesigned program. |
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The first supercomputers had a few more CPUs. |
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That number grew as microprocessors |
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became cheaper and faster. |
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Andrew Grimshaw, a computer science professor |
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at the University of Virginia explains: |
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"Today, supercomputers are all what we call parallel machines. |
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Instead of one CPU - central processing unit |
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- they have thousands and thousands. |
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And in the case of the Chinese machine, |
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depending on how you count, |
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millions of the central processing units." |
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These parallel machines are made up of |
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many individual computers called nodes. |
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They are all positioned in one block. |
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They used a lot of power, create a lot of heat, |
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and require huge cooling systems. |
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They also use programs different |
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from those used by ordinary computers. |
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Professor Grimshaw says anyone with enough resources |
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can build a supercomputer to solve problems |
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that require millions of mathematical calculations. |
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But that's not always necessary. |
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A virtual supercomputer can be created |
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by networking individual computers |
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within a university campus or company. |
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These machines then process data during down time, |
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when no one is using them. |
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"Those are very easy to run on virtual supercomputers |
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because each problem is independent of all the others |
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and I can scatter these jobs out all around the place. |
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We run these all the time at UVA." |
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Professor Grimshaw says that entire ten years ago, |
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engineers worked on making computers faster. |
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Since then, he says, they have worked to create |
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more powerful parallel machines. |
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"It's transforming science and engineering, |
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and it's going to continue to transform it |
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in ways I think most people don't fully grasp |
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- how well we can model and simulate the world now." |
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Professor Grimshaw says |
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the increasing computing ability of supercomputers |
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makes the future of research very bright. |
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And that's the Technology Report from VOA Learning English. |