LANL Introduces Hewlett Packard Enterprise, NVIDIA-Powered Supercomputer for AI Research

The Los Alamos National Laboratory unveiled a new supercomputer developed with Hewlett Packard Enterprise and NVIDIA on Monday, accelerating work on the use of artificial intelligence in advancing national security and basic research.

The Venado is an HPE Cray EX supercomputer networked with an HPE Slingshot 11 interconnect to supercharge its performance with extremely high-speed networking. It also comes with NVIDIA GH200 Grace Hopper superchips, capable of executing millions more instructions per second at lower cost and power consumption, LANL said. 

Ian Buck, vice president of hyperscale and high-performance computing at NVIDIA, said the Venado can deliver groundbreaking performance and energy efficiency while still accelerating scientific breakthroughs.

Trish Damkroger, senior vice president and general manager of high-performance computing and AI infrastructure solutions at HPE, said that powerful supercomputers help researchers achieve high-impact discoveries and solve real-world problems.

The Department of Energy laboratory started working with HPE in 2021, customizing the HPE supercomputer to help LANL advance analytics and AI capabilities. 

The DOE has been investing heavily in supercomputers in recent years. In 2021, it announced a $28 million commitment to five research projects that aim to maximize the potential of high-performance computers at its national laboratories.