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China unveiled its fastest supercomputer yesterday, which at its peak speed can do more than one quadrillion calculations per second, known as a petaflop.

The birth of the supercomputer, named "Tianhe", which means "Milky Way", makes China the second country, after the United States, to build a petaflop computer. This gigantic device can do as many calculations in one day as those done by an ordinary dual-core personal computer in 160 years, said Li Nan, director of the Tianhe Project Office under the National University of Defense Technology, developer of the supercomputer.

Tianhe, at a cost of 600 million yuan ($88 million), ranks first on China's Top 100 supercomputer list released in Changsha, capital of Hunan Province, with a theoretical peak performance of 1.206 petaflops and a Linpack performance of 560 teraflops.

The Linpack benchmark is used to measure the supercomputer's real performance in practical use.

The data has been submitted to the world Top 500 organization, which will release the new ranking list in November. According to the Top 500 list in June, Tianhe can be ranked the fourth most powerful supercomputer in the world.

（英語點津 Helen 編輯）

About the broadcaster:

Chantal Anderson is a multimedia journalist at the China Daily Web site. Originally from Seattle, Washington she has found her way around the world doing photo essays in Greece, Mexico and Thailand. She is currently completing a double degree in Journalism and International Studies from the University of Washington.