Graphics processing installation to boost Argonne's Blue Gene/P visualization capabilities

In this supercomputer visualization of a Type Ia supernova explosion, the green sphere shows the surface of the star. The colors blue through yellow show regions of increasingly high temperature. Nuclear burning in the yellow region, where the temperature is higher than a billion degrees, triggers the formation of a supersonic shock wave that incinerates the star. This detonation wave releases more energy in a fraction of a second than the Sun does in its entire lifetime and causes the star to explode at a velocity of 5,000 miles per second.