Georgia Tech has secured a $20 million investment from the U.S. National Science Foundation to develop “Nexus,” a cutting-edge supercomputer specifically designed to enhance AI capabilities for scientific research. Nexus aims to democratize access to advanced computational resources, empowering researchers nationwide.
The supercomputer will deliver an extraordinary 400 petaflops of computational power, capable of performing 400 quadrillion operations per second. With 330 terabytes of memory and 10 petabytes of flash storage, Nexus is engineered to handle large-scale AI and high-performance computing tasks, significantly accelerating scientific discovery.
Unlike traditional supercomputers with limited accessibility, Nexus will be open to researchers across the United States, managed under the guidance of the NSF to ensure equitable use. Georgia Tech will reserve 10% of the computing resources for internal research projects.
Developed in collaboration with the National Center for Supercomputing Applications at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Nexus will form part of a federated national research network, linked via high-speed connections to other computing resources nationwide.
Researchers will utilize Nexus to advance critical fields such as drug discovery, climate modeling, neuroscience, and robotics. Designed for ease of use, Nexus aims to remove technical barriers, streamline research workflows, and reduce the time required to achieve groundbreaking scientific results.
Georgia Tech President Ángel Cabrera highlighted Nexus as a cornerstone of the university’s commitment to fostering nationwide AI innovation. NSF’s director of advanced cyberinfrastructure, Katie Antypas, emphasized the potential of Nexus to significantly accelerate scientific discovery. Suresh Marru, principal investigator for Nexus, noted the platform’s importance in democratizing access to powerful AI tools, making cutting-edge research capabilities broadly available.
Scheduled to be operational by Spring 2026, Nexus positions Georgia Tech as a key driver of scientific innovation, transforming the landscape of AI research by providing advanced computational capabilities to researchers across the nation.