Visit to Fugaku

The Science and Technology Diplomatic Circle (S&TDC) Kansai recently had the opportunity to visit the world’s highest performance computer, Supercomputer Fugaku. Led by S&TDC Chair Dr. Felix Moesner, 29 consular colleagues were welcomed at the RIKEN Center for Computational Science (R-CCS), where they were treated to a presentation and tour from mastermind behind the computer, Director Dr. Satoshi Matsuoka.

Since June 2020, Japan’s supercomputer Fugaku has held the top spot of the TOP 500 list of the world's fastest supercomputers and has earned remarkable success in various benchmarks, including AI applications. With a power of 442 petaflops (quadrillions operations per second), Fugaku was built with a cost of US$ 700 million and a high energy efficiency, using only 30MW of energy. It is designed to assist in complex simulations in areas of importance to society such as medicine, pharmacology, disaster prediction, environmental sustainability, and energy. High-resolution simulations of weather phenomena, climate calculations, and Digital Twin-based research are also utilised by this supercomputer, specifically allowing progress in detecting and adapting to the effects of climate change.

The incredible work done by Director Dr. Satoshi Matsuoka and his teams have been recognised worldwide; most notably, winning the 2021 Gordon Bell Prize for calculations regarding Covid-19. Thus, S&TDC Chair Dr. Felix Moesner expresses his immense thanks to Director Dr. Satoshi Matsuoka and the team at the RIKEN Center for Computational Science for hosting the S&TDC Kansai. The achievements of Supercomputer Fugaku are truly impressive!