Internet2 fosters leading-edge education

Stephan Bohacek, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering

3:02 p.m., Nov. 24, 2004--UD researchers and classroom teachers increasingly are exploiting the speed of Internet2, the faster network that links government supercomputer centers and a select group of universities.

One of the charter members of the eight-year-old Internet2 consortium, UD has used the network to crunch numbers, follow weather patterns, perform remote experimentation and hold musical events with world-class artists.

One Internet2-based project at UD allows oceanographers from around the world to check surface currents in California’s Monterey Bay from their homes or offices.

Bruce Lipphardt Jr., associate scientist in marine studies, has been tracking data from remote sensors placed by the
Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif.

Because Internet2 connectivity has more bandwidth than the commercial Internet, Lipphardt’s team has transferred the massive amounts of geospatial data needed to compile hour-by-hour records of surface currents since July 2003 with few lapses.

Their results can be used by fishers looking for catches, environmentalists tracking algae growth or oil spills, Coast Guard search and rescue operations or surfers looking for the next big wave.

Recently, the ongoing Internet2 Land Speed contest witnessed data transmissions exceeding 4.3 gigabits a second sustained for 60 minutes over 29,000 kilometers. That’s more than 4,000 times today’s typical home broadband speed. While these extra capabilities are not needed by all researchers, those in astrophysics, climatology and bioinformatics are likely to require even faster networks within the next decade.

UD uses MAGPI, a network aggregation point at the University of Pennsylvania, to connect to the Abilene network that is Internet2’s backbone. The network was named for the Abilene, Kan., railroad junction that opened the American frontier to pioneers in the 1860s. Other specialized high-performance federal, research and education networks are accessible from Abilene.

“The new technologies being fostered by I2 are enabling development of virtual laboratories, biomedical digital libraries and collaborative teleimmersive environments for multisite, interactive 3-D visualizations,’’ Richard S. Sacher, manager of IT-User Services, said.

Internet2 brings real-time music lessons to UD students, and it allows students at other campuses to remotely control mass spectrometers and electron microscopes housed here.

In September, world-renowned composer Philip Glass, based in New York City, held a question-and-answer session with UD students via Internet2. MPEG-2 videoconferencing technology over I2’s network connection to Columbia University provided DVD-quality video and CD-quality audio. UD students and community members were able to listen to Glass’ music and participate in an interview with the composer. The Internet2 Applications Group lent the expensive MPEG-2 equipment to both universities to make the concert possible.

Even Internet2’s network can be studied through Internet2-based research collaborations. Stephan Bohacek, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, works with three California universities on the analysis of large-scale simulations of Internet traffic. He runs complex simulations of network performance on a UCLA supercomputer, consisting of 700 computing processor units, and transfers files containing hundreds or thousands of megabytes of results back to UD for processing.

“People know how the individual components of the Internet work, but there’s much we don’t know about how the big picture works,’’ Bohacek said, comparing it to a motorist who knows how to get into his car and drive to work but doesn’t know why traffic congestion occurs or how to alleviate it.

“I2’s Abilene network today provides high-performance connectivity to more than 200 I2 member universities in the U.S.,’’ Sacher said. “Abilene is also linked to more than 30 peer networks serving I2’s international partners on six continents.

“One of I2’s goals is to promote technology transfer to the broader educational community,’’ Sacher said. “It is succeeding in this through a secondary partnership with the educational community that provides full Abilene connectivity to more than 25,000 kindergarten-through-university settings in 32 states at present, thereby providing a rich environment for outreach and novel educational and research collaborations.’’

Article by Kathy Canavan
Photo by Kathy Atkinson

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