On May 7, UF administrators, research faculty, Dell executives, and Gainesville community leaders gathered at the East Campus to celebrate the grand opening of the UF Data Center. The event marked the unveiling of one of the most powerful university-based supercomputers in the country: HiPerGator.
“The UF Data Center is home to the fastest supercomputer in Florida, enabling UF and the state to recruit the brightest scholars from around the world,” said Vice President and CIO Elias Eldayrie. “Our expanded computing capacity will reap global dividends scientifically and strengthen Florida as a hub for technology and innovation.”
HiPerGator will attract the best faculty and post-doc candidates because of the supercomputer’s ability to process ‘big data’. The computational speed of HiPerGator is an astounding 150 trillion calculations per second. What does this mean? Data is processed faster, allowing faculty to analyze research and move/share findings with top institutions around the world. Before HiPerGator, UF professor David Ostrov needed months to conduct drug tests. Now, computations can be done in just hours.
“HiPerGator can help drugs get from the computer to the clinic more quickly. We want to discover and deliver safe, effective therapies that protect or restore people’s health as soon as we can,” Ostrov said.
Check out the HiPerGator fact sheet to learn more about the first supercomputer in the state of Florida! Additional information is available on the Research Computing Web page or by contacting UF Research Computing.