The most powerful GPU-accelerated cluster in France: University of Reims Romeo supercomputer ranked 5th of the Green500 list.

During the SC13, lot of exciting news, technologies, expectations, have been showcased and commented. Among great news, Connectikpeople has captured the important milestone realized by the University of Reims Romeo supercomputer ranked 5th of the Green500 list. Powered by NVIDIA Tesla K20X GPU accelerators, it billed as the most powerful GPU-accelerated cluster in France and also one of the greenest supercomputers in the world. Bull announced that the bullx supercomputer deployed at the ROMEO HPC Center of the University of Reims Champagne-Ardenne

is now fully operational.

For those who unfamiliar, Connectikpeople recalls that, the Green500 list is a ranking of the most energy-efficient supercomputers in the world. Systems listed in the Green500 must feature in the latest TOP500 list of the world's fastest supercomputers, the University of Reims' supercomputer is ranked 151th in the TOP500 list released at the SC Conference.

Connectikpeople has observed that, the "Romeo" system has been fully operational since October. Powered by 260 NVIDIA® Tesla® K20X GPU accelerators housed in 130bullx R421 E3 servers, the system can delivers 254.9 Tflops of performance based on the Linpack benchmark and features a free-cooling system based on the Bull Cool Cabinet Door.

It will be available for both industrial and academic researchers in the region, along with a panoply of services, including secured storage, software and support, as well as in-depth expertise in different engineering fields: HPC, applied mathematics, physics, biophysics and chemistry.

The scope of this project is to develop 10 medium-sized HPC centers, both in terms of computing power and their ability to develop joint projects with SMEs.  

About the ROMEO HPC Center and University of Reims Champagne-Ardenne (URCA)

The ROMEO HPC Center, Champagne Ardenne is an HPC platform hosted by the University of Reims Champagne-Ardenne and supported by the Champagne-Ardenne Region since 2002.

Its mission is to deliver high performance computing resources for both industrial and academic researchers in the region, along with an entire panoply of services such as secured storage space, specific software and support in its usage, as well as in-depth expertise in different engineering fields: HPC, applied mathematics, physics, biophysics and chemistry.

All these resources allow industrial and academic research teams to reduce their investments in equipment and personnel, while taking advantage of the latest technology and a support team of dedicated engineers. This represents a strong advantage in today's competitive environment, where modeling and simulation can significantly cut costs and development times for new research projects.

Since 2007, researchers have started to take an interest in GPU computing. This new field adds substantial computing power to our servers and allows new industrial challenges to be tackled that have a direct impact on people's lives in areas such as public transportation optimization or the development of new therapeutic approaches.

The ROMEO HPC Center has been involved since 2011 in the French Computing strategy as a special tier-2 to tier-1 provisioning center since it is a member of the Equip@meso consortium founded by the French government (Investissements d'Avenir) and coordinated by GENCI (Organization for French High Performance Computing in public research). The scope of this project is to develop 10 medium-sized HPC centers, both in terms of computing power and their ability to develop joint projects with SMEs.

The University of Reims Champagne-Ardenne (URCA) is a multidisciplinary university which develops innovative, fundamental and applied research in more than 30 laboratories. With 1,557 professors and professor-researchers-including 126 hospital practitioners-as well as a technical and administrative staff of 1,038, URCA hosts more than 22,000 students from undergraduate to doctorate graduation level over the whole Champagne-Ardenne Region: Reims (main site), Troyes, Charleville-Mézières, Châlons en Champagne and Chaumont.

The university makes a large contribution to the development of Champagne-Ardenne through its partnerships with local and national companies and the regional authorities.

URCA wishes to attract international students and has consequently begun the construction of an interregional and international cluster (PRES) which will include the main higher education institutions of the Champagne-Ardenne and Picardie Regions, and Walloon universities in Belgium.

Located close to the Ile-de-France -30 minutes from central Paris and Roissy Airport by TGV-, the Rhineland, Northern Europe and Italy, URCA occupies a geostrategic position which is favorable to European and international exchanges.