Summer 2022 Pawsey update
As we in Perth welcome the season of Birak, the first summer season in the Noongar calendar, we are delighted to share some news from Pawsey.
Pawsey Executive Director Mark Stickells presents a year in review to the Pawsey team. watched over by a collection of quokkas adorning their SKA-Low antenna Christmas tree! Credit: Pawsey Supercomputing Research Centre.
‘Tis the season for celebrating
Before we report our news, we do want to acknowledge the wonderful new dual name for the site, Inyarrimanha Ilgari Bundara, the CSIRO Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory, celebrated following the signing the Indigenous Land Use Agreement and followed shortly after by the announcement of the beginning of construction of the SKAO in Australia and South Africa.
My colleagues from Pawsey and I were delighted to support the week of celebration in Perth, and we were pleased to host many SKAO colleagues and key stakeholders visiting our Centre and wanting to know more about Setonix.
Going greener
Setonix, Australia’s newest research supercomputer made headlines in November after being ranked by the Green500 list as the world’s fourth greenest supercomputer.
The Green500 is the global benchmark for efficient high-performance computing. The ranking means that once fully available to researchers in early 2023, Setonix will enable discoveries in domains such as radio astronomy, energy and resources, engineering, bioinformatics, health sciences and climate science while lowering its environmental impact.
Setonix is truly world-class technology and is uses the same platform and architecture as exascale supercomputers Frontier in the US and LUMI in Finland. In addition to its energy efficiency performance, it was also named the most powerful public research supercomputer in the Southern Hemisphere, ranking 15 in the global Top500.
Funding boost
Pawsey and its partners also welcomed $22.4 million in funding from the Western Australian Government over five years, to support the positioning of WA as an international leader in high-performance computing (HPC).
A task fit for a supercomputer
In the spirit of the season and approaching the end of a year of milestones, I had the honour of ‘judging’ the ‘inaugural Intergalactic Gingerbread House Construction Activity That Definitely Is Not A Competition.’ (IGHCATDINAC). It was a significant responsibility bestowed upon me by Site Entity leader, Rebecca Wheadon, and I needed the power of a supercomputer to determine a first among equals in this inaugural national ginger-bread house building event.
Unfortunately, Setonix was taken up with other scientific duties that day and the subjective decision was left to me. Congratulations to all that participated, you can see for yourself the fruits of their creative efforts.
From all at Pawsey, best wishes for festive season and a safe and prosperous New Year.
Mark Stickells, Executive Director, Pawsey Supercomputing Research Centre