More than 200 scientists, researchers, and students gathered at the Texas Advanced Computing Center in September for the ninth annual TACC Symposium for Texas Researchers, marking a record turnout for the event.
The gathering brought together participants from 30 universities, high schools, and industry sectors across Texas, according to Utexas. Attendees shared findings through keynotes, tutorials, lightning talks, and poster presentations, while also participating in a town hall meeting with center leaders.
State of the Center and Nationwide Computing Reach
During his state-of-the-center address, TACC Executive Director Dan Stanzione noted the milestone of the center’s 25th anniversary in June, stating that computing continues to evolve rapidly. According to Utexas, more than 130,000 U.S. researchers have utilized TACC systems since 2001. Allocations are distributed nationwide through internal reviews and the U.S. National Science Foundation-funded ACCESS program. TACC users accounted for 55 percent of all NSF funding awarded to the UT System during fiscal year 2025-2026.
Retirement of Frontera and Advances in Research
The symposium unfolded against a backdrop of major technological transitions. TACC’s Frontera supercomputer, which served for most of its service life as the fastest academic supercomputer in the United States, was retired in October 2026 after surpassing eight million jobs, according to Utexas. Stanzione stated, It’s hard to say goodbye to our venerable machine, Frontera.
Meanwhile, researchers are leveraging newer architectures like the U.S. NSF LCCF Horizon supercomputer and TACC’s Vista system.
In scientific applications presented at the event, researchers detailed substantial performance gains. For instance, studying synaptic transmission, researcher Rizo-Rey noted that a simulation of a 5.3 million-atom system previously required 64 CPU nodes of Frontera to achieve 43 nanoseconds per day, whereas TACC’s Vista system accomplished nearly identical speeds using only eight GPU nodes with GROMACS optimizations.
Award Winners and Clinical Innovations
The event also highlighted clinical and computational breakthroughs, including Jeanne Kowalski-Muegge of the Dell Medical School discussing clinical AI in oncology, and Sneha Bhamidipaty of UT Austin presenting work on Tapis frameworks for predicting tumor growth. Additionally, Paul A. Navrátil Young Researcher Award winners were recognized, including Çınar Turhan for excellence in presentation and Sreeram Venkat for excellence in publication, alongside poster winners David Katz and Hyunje Yang.