HPC computation cluster for biochemical research activities

MEGWARE recently implemented the new HPC computation cluster “HOT” at the Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces (MPICI) in Golm. Since this latest system has increased the institute's computing power fivefold, the name is synonymous with outstanding performance and – due to the high density of nodes and multitude of GPUs – it is also so called because it also actually generates heat.

For its scientific computing purposes, MPICI has a total of 1,680 CPU cores and an overall computing power of 69.9 TFlop/s at its disposal. The cluster is equipped with 84 dual socket compute nodes from the Intel Xeon Haswell series. 4 NVIDIA GeForce GPUs are installed in each node. To enable the transfer of data within the system with low latency and high bandwidth, all nodes have been integrated in a QDR InfiniBand, as well as in two powerful Ethernet networks, in the case of the nodes for administration and storage.

“MEGWARE has proven a competent partner and reliable provider of complete turnkey solutions, and also meets the specific hardware and software requirements of scientific HPC,” explains Roy Pfitzner, Head of IT at MPICI. “Particular pluses are its employees’ high-quality expert advice on HPC issues and the intensive preliminary testing.”

The powerful cluster system now supports the data and CPU-intensive research work carried out by the Department of Theory & Bio-Systems. It is ideally suited to complex molecular dynamic simulations, used to examine the structure and dynamics of molecular groups and other nanostructures in biological and biomimetic systems. Comprehensive real-time data analyses are carried out in this field, something that’s possible only with massive computing power.