UC San Diego Accelerates AI Research with NVIDIA DGX B200 Gift

UC San Diego Boosts AI Research with NVIDIA’s DGX B200 Gift

The University of California San Diego’s School of Computing, Information and Data Sciences (SCIDS) has received a powerful new asset for artificial intelligence research. NVIDIA donated a DGX B200 system, one of the most advanced AI computing platforms available today, to support the MLSys Group and the Hao AI Lab led by Assistant Professor Hao Zhang.

This gift comes as recognition of Zhang’s contributions to machine learning (ML) and systems research, as well as the growing impact of SCIDS in AI innovation and education. The system is installed at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC), providing faculty and students access to industry-grade AI infrastructure.

Accelerating AI Research and Collaboration

The DGX B200 will enhance UC San Diego’s ability to conduct research in AI system design, model efficiency, and application areas such as healthcare, robotics, and education. It supports the development of new research papers, student projects, and interdisciplinary collaborations across departments.

Rajesh K. Gupta, Interim Dean of SCIDS, highlighted the value of this gift: “NVIDIA’s DGX B200 provides our community with hands-on experience and infrastructure essential to training top talent. Their early support for promising researchers is commendable.”

Key Technical Features of the DGX B200

• Extreme Speed: Delivers one of the fastest AI computing environments available.
• Large Memory Capacity: Enables handling of massive models in memory, reducing wait times and improving results.
• AI-Ready Architecture: Built specifically for the latest AI workloads, including large language models (LLMs) and diffusion models.
• Plug-and-Play Setup: Comes with integrated software tools and optimizations, allowing researchers to focus on experimentation instead of configuration.

The system leverages NVIDIA’s Blackwell accelerated computing architecture to run thousands of parallel computations. Its multi-GPU setup efficiently trains and serves large-scale models like ChatGPT, dramatically reducing training times compared to traditional supercomputers.

Supporting UC San Diego’s Research Ambitions

Hao Zhang emphasized the system’s role in enabling advanced research in ML, LLMs, and scientific computing. “DGX B200 systems bring university researchers the kind of compute scale used by leading companies such as OpenAI, Meta, and xAI,” Zhang said. “This gift firmly establishes UC San Diego as a site for impactful AI research that extends beyond theoretical work.”

The system will be used by faculty, Ph.D. students, and postdoctoral researchers working on AI, data science, and computational science projects.

Long-Term Impact

Frank Würthwein, Director of SDSC, noted that breakthroughs enabled by this machine could improve AI efficiency, accelerate medical discoveries, and support next-generation model training. He expressed gratitude to NVIDIA for contributing to the development of AI talent in the United States.

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