IBM's Watson supercomputer is about to begun work evaluating evidence-based cancer treatment options that can be delivered to the physician in a matter of seconds for assessment.

T-Platforms, a Moscow-based tech company that has built some of that nation's largest systems, is developing a 10-petaflop supercomputer for M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University, the company said this week.

China can use its power of government control to bring major changes quickly, and it is moving to expand parallel programming training to help its supercomputing efforts -- and possibly its outsourcing industry, too.

The SC11 supercomputing conference in Seattle last month saw an almost obsessive focus on the development of an exascale computing system -- one that would be roughly 1,000 times more powerful than any existing system -- before the end of the decade .

Many small to mid-size manufacturing companies do not use high performance computing (HPC) to create and test potential parts and products virtually because of cost concerns. But one firm that did make the investment in HPC developed a new product line -- and subsequently doubled in size.

There is a worldwide race to build the next generation of supercomputers, but U.S. efforts have stalled.

The international competition to build an exascale supercomputer is gaining steam, especially in China and Europe, according to Peter Beckman , a top computer scientist at the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory.

IBM mainframes will soon be able to manage Windows applications, bridging one of the last major divides in data centers.

Kristine Harper and her father, Tom, both work on mainframe computers. BOSTON - Kristine Harper was about 12-years-old when her father took her to his office to take part of a "take your daughter to work day." Tom Harper said his daughter was less than enthusiastic about his profession that day.