After five years of use, the supercomputer that powers Louisiana’s Optical Network Initiative is nearing the end of its life.
The computer, nicknamed Queen Bee, has sat in the state’s Information Systems Building, quietly humming since it was purchased by LONI in 2007.
According to LONI’s website, Queen Bee’s name comes from a nickname given to former Gov. Kathleen Blanco.
Most personal computers only contain two or four cores, but Queen Bee contains 5,440 cores, according to a list of the top 500 supercomputers in the world. In 2007, LONI’s supercomputer ranked 23rd on the list. However, the supercomputer is no longer ranked.
Queen Bee also provides a memory capacity of 50 teraflops to the LONI network. A computer processing at data speeds measured in teraflops can solve complicated math problems found in 4000-level classes in a nanosecond.
The supercomputer has six smaller counterparts located at LONI member schools. Referred to as worker bees, some of these computers have human names, such as Eric, Oliver and Louie. Other names include Posedion, Painter and Sat(ellite).
But at five years old, the machines are quickly becoming obsolete, according to LONI Executive Director Donald Vandal.
“The fact that we still have some space left on what we purchased five years ago means we made some very wise decisions,” Vandal said at the Board of Regents’ August meeting. “But, at the same time, we need to replace these machines in order to continue to provide the same quality.”
Vandal said replacing Queen Bee is the top priority because of its hefty price tag.
“We are estimating that in today’s high performance computing environment, an investment of from $5 million to $9 million would provide a very good replacement of Queen Bee,” Vandal said in an email. “We estimate that at the upper end, we would likely have a machine that could provide 750 teraflops or more of computing power.”
Leslie Guice, vice president for Research and Development at Louisiana Tech and member of the LONI management counsel, explained the importance of maintaining LONI.
“I am sure you have heard of the Higgs Boson particle that was discovered at CERN in Switzerland,” Guice said at the Board of Regents’ August meeting. “Several students and faculty played a role in discovering the particle because of LONI.”
Other fields that are researched on the LONI network include energy research, flow of porous materials and hurricane surge modeling.
Although the current machines still function properly, Vandal said the new machines could take the network to a higher level.
“The capabilities and power of such a replacement would far exceed that of Queen Bee,” he said in an email. “A new, more powerful machine could run larger, more complex, more detailed and sophisticated models and simulations for scientific research, hurricane surge modeling and risk assessments.”
Once LONI replaces Queen Bee, her parts will be cannibalized to keep the other smaller clusters running as they age.
In addition to providing top-notch research capabilities to higher education in Louisiana, LONI is a state-of-the-art fiber optics network connected to 79 colleges and universities around the state. The network also provides commodity Internet to all students at the University as a part of their technology fee.
