Oak Ridge National Laboratory is seeking industry proposals to research and develop hardware, software and related technologies that could make high-performance computing energy efficient.
The R&D work will be performed under the $23 million New Frontiers program, which aims to produce the technologies within five to 10 years to enable faster and energy-efficient computing needed to build future generations of computers for addressing challenges in science, energy, health and security, the Department of Energy said Friday.
HPC and data-driven modeling and simulation are essential to advancing DOE’s science missions and are key investment areas for the Office of Science, which employs three of the top 10 fastest supercomputers in the world for open scientific research.
However, ORNL’s Christopher Zimmer, New Frontiers project director, said current HPC technology trends “threaten to have a disruptive and costly impact on the development of DOE applications and potentially a negative impact on the productivity of DOE scientists.”
The entities selected through the request for proposals will be awarded two-year contracts to advance HPC.
The RFP, managed by UT-Battelle, provides interested parties until Oct. 21 to submit their responses.