The strongest Croatian supercomputer, named Supek, the first petascale computer in Croatia achieved with HPE Cray technology, featuring a total of 8384 processor cores and 81 graphics processors, with 32 TB of RAM, delivering a power of 1.25 PFLOP/s, was presented to the public at the end of March this year.
The Supek supercomputer is available to users who require high-performance computing (high-performance computing or HPC), executing applications with very high performance and capacity demands across various computing resources – processor cores – accelerators such as graphics processors, RAM, storage, and network connectivity.
It was developed as part of the national strategic project ‘Croatian Scientific and Educational Cloud’ (HR-ZOO) conducted by the University Computing Centre (Srce) and partners, which established a network of five data centers in four cities, modernizing and technologically aligning two services – advanced computing and virtual data centers. This supercomputer has established a unique national shared e-infrastructure for the development of research, innovation, and business capacities in science and higher education in Croatia.
For Some Free of Charge
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The supercomputer is named after the Croatian scientist, physicist, and philosopher Ivan Supek and will enable significant technological, qualitative, and resource advancements in Srce’s services. For example, the advanced computing service is based on two resources: the Supek supercomputer and the cloud computing resource Vrančić, while the virtual data center service is based on the resource for virtual data centers Štampar, allowing for the execution of 1800 redundant virtual servers with 10 PB of disk space. The constructed HR-ZOO e-infrastructure is connected to pan-European e-infrastructures and ensures better connectivity of the Croatian higher education and research space with Europe.
Access rights to Supek are granted for research projects funded from public sources for which at least fifty percent of the funds are secured from the state budget. This supercomputer can also be used free of charge by the economy, i.e., those entities participating in projects that meet the specified criteria.
Interest has been shown by users of HPC Srce – the Isabella computing cluster, according to whose 2022 report the largest user is the Ruđer Bošković Institute, followed by the Institute of Physics, the J. J. Strossmayer University of Osijek, the Faculty of Pharmacy and Biochemistry, and the Faculty of Science of the University of Zagreb, indicating that standard large users from the scientific fields of physics, computational chemistry, and biology are represented among HPC users.
Due to the large number of graphics processors, Supek is extremely interesting to artificial intelligence (AI) researchers, and Srce expects other faculties of the University of Zagreb and those from universities in Osijek, Split, and Rijeka as users. Users access the Supek supercomputer remotely via two access computers: one with the characteristics of nodes with processor resources and the other with the characteristics of nodes with graphics processors.
From the access computers, users execute their applications on the supercomputer using the PBS Professional job management system. Using personal computers, researchers perform complex computational calculations. The new supercomputer is not on the world’s top 500 supercomputers list, although it is based on the same technology (Cray) as the first, third, and eighth computers on that list published in November 2022. The list of the 500 fastest supercomputers in the world is published twice a year, and each time the entry threshold is significantly raised. According to the latest list from November 2022, the threshold is 1.73 PFLOP/s, which is why Supek, with 1.25 PFLOP/s, cannot enter it.
The goal was never to reach that list but to build a unique, complex national e-infrastructure by constructing modern data centers in four cities connected by broadband network capacities and installing advanced computing, storage, and network resources to modernize and technologically upgrade Srce’s computing services.
– The goal of building the supercomputer component was never to reach the top 500 fastest supercomputers list, considering the dynamics of changes and the basis on satisfying a wide range of applications, rather than two or three specific applications around which the supercomputer is built. The key to the success of the supercomputer lies in providing quality support to users and the installation and optimization of scientific applications that researchers execute on it – they convey from Srce.
Extremely Important Projects
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In Croatia, there has been a supercomputer Bura for years, located at the Center for Advanced Computing and Modeling (CNRM) of the University of Rijeka. Initially, it was used only for scientific research work, primarily by the University of Rijeka, but since 2021, access has been fully granted to other scientists and the economy. It is used by the automotive and pharmaceutical industries, energy, engineering, hydrotechnics, shipbuilding…
Collaboration has been established with companies from Croatia and the European Union such as Rimac Automobili, Xellia, In silico, Kongsberg Maritime, Lürssen Design Center Kvarner, Hydrotec, BfG DE, Kolektor, Gecom… HPC Bura is preparing to receive data from one of the largest telescopes in the world, the Vera C. Rubin Observatory (VRO). For this purpose, it is being equipped with a new data infrastructure as a large influx of data is expected, making Bura one of the more important supercomputers applied in astronomy.
– Access to HPC Bura and projects related to it can roughly be categorized into three categories: scientific research projects, strategic projects of collaboration between the University and its components with the economy, and commercial use. Scientific research and strategic projects with industry fall into the category of projects that achieve the right to effectively unlimited access to HPC resources.
There are extremely important projects in the fields of physics, astrophysics, biochemistry, biotechnology, and drug research, as well as strategic projects of the University – EDIH Adria and North Adriatic Hydrogen Valley. Collaborations and projects with industry, if they are commercial, led by the Faculty of Engineering or the Center for Advanced Computing and Modeling of the University of Rijeka, most often also include commercial leasing of computing capacity, which is a common approach in most global HPC centers. The application area of HPC Bura is extremely diverse: from climatology, energy, medicine, and drug development to physics, digital technologies, and engineering in general.
The general limitation is the scientific support we can provide, but if it is not necessary, when we are only talking about access to resources, project application has no limitations. One of the extremely important partners is the Ruđer Bošković Institute, which has secured a computing segment of Bura for research purposes – says Gordan Janeš, head of the service at the Center for Advanced Computing and Modeling of the University of Rijeka.
The work and results of Bura, he emphasizes, are the work of a team that includes Prof. Dr. Lado Kranjčević, who is also the head of CNRM and the dean of the Rijeka Faculty of Engineering, and his colleague from that faculty Ante Sikirica. Among the projects they have conducted or are currently conducting are, for example, North Adriatic Hydrogen Valley, European Digital Innovation Hub Adriatic, European Digital Innovation Hub AI4HEALTH.Cro, Computational model of flow, flooding, and spread of pollution in rivers and coastal marine areas, National Competence Centres in the Framework of EuroHPC, Development of control and defense systems for ports against the introduction of foreign species, Digital Empowering Through HPC Education, Autonomous system of unmanned aerial vehicles for search and rescue at sea, Design of catalytically active peptides and peptide nanostructures, Development of models for assessing the behavior of materials based on machine learning… According to Janeš, members of CNRM, the organizational unit managing the operation of HPC Bura, along with project partners and collaborators, publish more than fifty scientific papers a year, half of which are in Q1 category journals.
Key Role in Research
– HPC Bura, one of the most powerful supercomputers in Croatia, has played a key role in supporting research in the Croatian academic community and the economy in general. Bura has been used in various scientific fields such as astrophysics, biotechnology, medicine, climatology, materials science, and generally in physics and engineering.
It has contributed to improving the quality of research and development in Croatia by providing scientists and researchers with high-quality and fast access to computing infrastructure that enables complex simulations, analyses, and the development of digital models. It has also played an important role in supporting various industrial sectors in Croatia, including the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, energy, engineering, and automotive industries – says Janeš.
What is Stronger
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Access to the supercomputer, Janeš adds, has enabled companies and organizations to develop new products and services faster and more efficiently, optimize production processes, and reduce costs. Furthermore, this supercomputer is also used by startups to accelerate development processes and complex data analyses. One example is the startup In silico from the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture of the University of Zagreb. At the time of its launch, HPC Bura was the 441st supercomputer in the world, but due to the rapid development of HPC technology, it is no longer on that list.
– Although this year Srce launched a new supercomputer, the cluster part of the latest Croatian HPC, which is based solely on processors, still has lower performance than the equivalent cluster HPC Bura. On the other hand, the new HPC system of Srce has extremely good performance for those applications that can utilize GPU acceleration – explains Janeš, adding that the long-term plan is to find funding sources or partners who could secure funds for the acquisition of a new system that will enable Croatia to secure its place on the list of the fastest supercomputers in the world and promote and expand HPC in Croatian companies, especially startups.
