The fastest supercomputer in the world has officially launched at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LNNL) in California.
The supercomputer, called “El Capitan,” cost $600 million to build and will handle various sensitive and classified tasks including securing the U.S. stockpile of nuclear weapons in the absence of underground testing, according to LNNL representatives. This was prohibited in 1992.
Research will primarily be focused on national security, including material discovery, high-energy-density physics, nuclear data and weapon design, as well as other classified tasks.
Construction on the machine began in May 2023, and it came online in November 2024, before being officially dedicated on Jan. 9.
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