Brookings January 12, 2022
Using finely tuned hardware, a specialized network, and large data storage, supercomputers have long been used for computationally intense projects that require large amounts of data processing. With the rise of artificial intelligence and machine learning, there is an increasing demand for these powerful computers and, as a result, processing power is rapidly increasing. As such, the growth of AI is inextricably linked to the growth in processing power of these high-performing devices.
Supercomputers aren’t new. The term appeared in the late 1920s and the CDC 6600 (released in 1964) is generally considered to be the first true supercomputer. Early supercomputers used only a few extremely powerful processors but, in the late 1990s, computer experts...