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The UF Office of Information Technology Newsletter | |
| National Lambda Rail Goes Live | |
National LambdaRail (NLR) is a major initiative of U.S. research universities and private-sector technology companies to provide a nationwide infrastructure for research and experimentation in networking technologies and applications. The first leg of the NLR opened in November 2003 between the TeraGrid facility in Chicago and the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center.
An emerging fiber-optic network, the NLR will accelerate data-transfer speeds. The state's Florida LambdaRail (FLR) will become a major node on this National LambdaRail. The University of Florida is a charter member of the FLR corporation. As of early December, other members included: Florida Atlantic University, Florida Institute of Technology, Florida International University, Florida State University, Nova Southeastern University, University of Central Florida, University of Miami and University of West Florida.
The NLR will eventually include the Florida rail once the Florida leg is built. Then researchers at partner institutions like UF can access this lightening-fast connection. The FLR project has a target date of November 2004.
The FLR network will provide a 100-fold increase in data-transfer capacity with other institutions that are members of the NLR, FLR and other networks, which will be interconnected world-wide. Another benefit for the university of FLR is a lower-cost commodity Internet and Internet2 service.
According to CNS Assistant Director David Pokorney, UF CNS is providing engineering and network design services for the FLR network. CNS has submitted a proposal to provide Network Operations Center services for the FLR as well.
"The facilities provided are not like the present Internet or Internet2. The FLR/NLR network will provide the researchers access at the lowest layers of the network and include both switched or point-to-point circuits over a wide area. The new facilities include a point-to-point 10Gbps (ten gigabit per second) data channel to any other NLR or FLR member. Additional high-speed connectivity to places around the world will be available through interconnections with the StarLight optical network for high-performance applications," Pokorney said. See http://www.startap.net/starlight .
Pokorney said that access to the high-speed rail will be transparent for some services. However, for specific research needs, planning and additional network infrastructure will be required and installed directly to the researcher requesting those network services.
For more information about the Florida LambdaRail, please see http://www.flrnet.org .
For more information about the National LambdaRail, see http://www.nationallambdarail.org .