President Obama has signed an executive order establishing the National Strategic Computing Initiative (NSCI), aimed at advancing American research efforts that require high-capacity computing (HCC).

The program aims to create the world’s fastest supercomputer, which would be 20 times faster than current’s fastest supercomputer, China’s Tianhe-2. According to the White House, the machine would be called an exascale computer capable of performing 1 million trillion or 1 exaflops—calculations per second.

The computational powers of these supercomputers have allowed for simulated nuclear weapons tests, and been effective in diagnosing and managing diseases in precision medicine initiatives.

President Obama has established the NSCI to increase both the computing power and storage capacity necessary for research projects such as the Precision Medicine Initiative.

Plans for the exascale machine are to be operational by 2025.