NRELEd: Super Table Setting

There are many things that home computers are very good at--emails, writing papers, searching the internet. However, if home computer were to try to do too many calculations at one time, it would begin to perform very slowly. Think about how long it takes to load web pages when there are too many tabs open in an internet browser. Home computers are limited in how much data they can process at one time. This is why scientists use super computers. Super computers can do many calculations all at once. NREL’s super computer is named Eagle (upgraded from Peregrine in 2019). NREL’s scientists use Eagle to do complex calculations and simulations. They can then turn that data into models. To help discern the different between the two computer types, you will complete a relay race and then compare the results for how long it takes you to set two table settings.