Penn’s Newest Supercomputer is Transforming Research

The Penn Advanced Research Computing Center (PARCC) is a centralized core facility that supports high-performance computing, AI, and data-driven research across the University. It reflects Penn’s commitment to accelerating impactful, interdisciplinary research through strategic leadership, operational support, and an administrative framework.

A key feature of this ecosystem is “Betty,” Penn’s first University-wide HPC and AI cluster — a group of connected computers that function as a single, far more powerful machine. Launched in May 2025, Betty ranks among the top supercomputers in the world  189th globally — and places in the top ten among academic institutions.

Named for Frances Elizabeth “Betty” Snyder Holberton, one of the original programmers of Penn’s Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC) — the world’s first programmable, general-purpose electronic digital computer — Betty was designed to support the most demanding computational workloads across disciplines. The system enables researchers to run complex simulations, analyze massive datasets, and train AI models far more quickly than on a typical desktop computer.

Less than a year after its launch, Betty supports approximately 400 users across 70 research groups, including around 200 active users — some of whom are new to high-performance computing research. Notably, it is reshaping research at Penn, expanding access to powerful computing resources, enabling work that was previously out of reach.

“Betty is accelerating research across the spectrum. We have examples of computing times dropping from months to days and from weeks to hours,” says David Meaney, vice provost for research. “Just as importantly, faculty are now tackling problems that they thought they could never tackle, at speeds they could not imagine.

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