IBM backs $100m supercomputer centre

IBM, in conjunction with other companies, will help build a supercomputer centre at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in the US. The centre is expected to develop new semiconductors and advancing nanotechnology.

The new Computational Center for Nanotechnology Innovations, planned to be operational by the end of the year, will be the largest supercomputing centre at a university and one of the 10 largest in the world, according to its backers. Rensselaer is already a major centre for nanotechnology research and part of governor George Pataki's strategy to make the state one of the leaders in the field through tax breaks, infrastructure and educational programmes.

The budget for the centre is roughly $100m.

Cadence, which makes semiconductor design tools, and AMD will participate as well. AMD and IBM, among others, are already part of an effort to build a lithography research centre in Albany. (Hector Ruiz said in 2003 that New York State was the only region in the US that was aggressively courting the electronics industry.)

At the Rensselaer supercomputing centre, scientists will attempt to design transistors and other devices measuring only a few nanometres long (a nanometre is a billionth of a metre) and simulate how different atoms and materials interact. Today's chips sport features measuring less than 65 nanometres and consist of only a few atoms. By 2015, features on some chips will measure only 22 nanometres.

Michael Kanellos writes for CNET News.com