Early History 1956-1959
- IBM wins tender to build a new supercomputer for US weapons R&D: IBM7030 (STRETCH)
- UKAEA has need for additional computer power for 3D calculations:
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Aldermaston: Weapons Research
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Risley: Reactor Physics
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Harwell: Basic Research
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Winfrith: Reactor Physics
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Culham: Thermonuclear Research
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75% of UK's academic/research computer power is owned by UKAEA
- Aldermaston get approval eventually to rent an IBM Stretch arriving in 1962
- Predicted power needed by Harwell is a computer similar to Stretch
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Ferranti/Manchester University decide to build Atlas
- See NRDC and the case for a British supercomputer, 1956 - 1960 by Simon Lavington (http://elearn.cs.man.ac.uk/~atlas/)
- National Institute for Research into Nuclear Science (NIRNS) formed to run the Rutherford Laboratory, an off shoot from Harwell building the Nimrod Accelerator
- NIRNS Charter gives universities free access to NIRNS resources
- Harwell Computer Group run by Jack Howlett, main computer a Ferranti Mercury
- Nimrod designed on Mercury using Mercury Autocode