Sun Powers Biggest LatAm Cluster

SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ:JAVA) today announced Sao Paulo University (UNESP) has chosen Sun to power the largest computing cluster in Latin America which will span across seven different sites in So Paulo State. The “UNESP Computer Capacity Integration (GridUNESP)” compute cluster, based on Sun Microsystems technology, will give research groups in the University access to the highest levels of processing capacity and data storage capacity to be used for particle physics, genetics, meteorology, medicine, and other areas of scientific investigation.

The central cluster of systems, which will be installed at the new UNESP campus in Barra Funda, Sao Paulo - will have 2048 processing nuclei and a compute capacity of 23.2 TFlops. The complete system which is made up of the central cluster and seven others will total 33.32 TFlops. GridUNESP will have a high speed connection to the North American Internet2 by means of the MetroSampa Network — which inter-connects educational, cultural, and research institutions in the metropolitan region of São Paulo — and also to the Open Science Grid, which integrates computer resources in fifty sites across the United States, Europe, Asia, Australia, and Latin America

The selection of Sun Microsystems of Brazil for GridUNESP was made in strict compliance with the requirements of the Tenders and Contracts Law, and was preceded by a wide consultation with different companies specializing in high performance computing (HPC). Definition of the specifications and analysis of the technical and commercial bids was monitored by a multi-institutional commission, made up of professionals who specialize in HPC. "Sun was selected as it showed the best technical expertise and the best price from the bids submitted," said GridUNESP's general coordinator, Sérgio Ferraz Novaes, professor of the Theoretical Physics Institute (IFT) at UNESP.

Sun Microsystems Inc.