The world’s fastest new supercomputer, named Roadrunner was unveiled at the IBM research laboratory in Poughkeepsie, New York. During an exercise prepared by the scientists involved in the project, the $100 million machine managed to perform 1,000 trillion calculations per second.

Its performances are twice as good as IBM’s Blue Gene system at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, which until now was three times faster than any other supercomputer. The project demanded the collaboration of engineers from the Los Alamos National Laboratory and from IBM Corp.

Its abilities will be mostly used on nuclear weapons-related issues such as monitoring missions and nuclear explosions simulations but according to its developers it could also bring massive contributions in other areas such as engineering, medicine and science, such as the global energy challenge.

"The computer is a speed demon. It will allow us to solve tremendous problems," said Thomas D'Agostino, head of the National Nuclear Security Administration, according to the Associated Press.

The computer’s system spreads on a 6,000 square feet area covered with 57 mile of fiber optics and weighs approximately 500,000 pounds. The technology implemented in the computer demanded six years of research and studies.

According to IBM’s estimates, the work done by the Roadrunner in a single day could equal the world’s 6 billion people working on 6 billion computers for a period of 46 years.

In order to continue the successful development of the activity, the Roadrunner supercomputer will be relocated next month to the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.