How Public Investment in HPC Sparked the AI Boom

Decades of public investment in high performance computing (HPC) research paved the way for today’s supercomputers—critical engines behind the rise of artificial intelligence. This foundation made possible the explosive growth of private investment in AI, now reaching hundreds of billions of dollars annually to develop increasingly large and powerful models.

“The innovations that got us to this point came out of public investment,” Stanzione said. “Open academic research had to get to a certain point in developing the technologies that built AI before industry made them commercially viable."

The immense market impact of AI is driving the technologies scientists use for simulation. As scientists adapt to changes in the computational landscape, the field of HPC is harnessing AI in an accurate and uncompromising way that takes advantage of its power and economic efficiencies.

Leadership in both HPC and AI provides significant economic impacts, primarily through increased efficiency, cost savings, and innovation across various sectors like research, manufacturing, and healthcare. Working together, both enable faster analysis, simulations, and development, leading to reduced costs, quicker time-to-market, and improved product quality. 

Key moments of the podcast include:

• [1:25] Advancements in the academic HPC community have driven the success of AI in the marketplace.
• [4:40] Scientists are using AI guided optimizations in wide-ranging fields, such as drug design, aerospace, and materials design.
• [7:03] Breakthrough innovations that drive technologies to the brink of commercial success are fueled by public investment in scientific research.
• [10:38] Opportunities abound for scientists to take advantage of AI.
• [13:50] TACC is helping scientists by providing AI-focused supercomputers and staff expertise in optimizing software that makes best use of the systems.
• [15:24] TACC continues to build the NSF Leadership-Class Computing Facility intended to continue the transition of AI for science nationwide.
• [16:54] Urgent computing powered by TACC resources delivers life-saving results in critical moments—accelerating forecasts for hurricane storm surge, supporting rapid wildfire response, and expediting drug discovery for emerging diseases.
• [19:12] Emerging trends such as edge computing and quantum computing are seeing tremendous growth and spurring research activity.