Argonne Leadership Computing Facility’s new computer, named “Mira,” is an IBM Blue Gene/Q, the third generation in a line of supercomputers that has topped the performance charts. Mira has been ranked the fourth fastest supercomputer in the world as of November 2012. Beyond providing hours of computing time, Mira itself is a stepping stone toward the next great goal of supercomputing: exascale speed, where computers will calculate quintillions of floating point operations per second. That’s a thousand times faster than today’s top machines.

Mira will provide billions more processor-hours per year to the scientists, engineers, and researchers who use it to run complex simulations of everything from nuclear reactors to blood vessels through allocations awarded through INCITE, ALCC and Director’s Discretionary programs.