A new network under development by Internet2 will give researchers at member colleges and other participating institutions up to 10 times more bandwidth—making it easier and faster to share large data sets.
The Internet2 network now allows users to transfer up to 10 gigabits per second. The new network will bring that up to 100 gigabits per second. The key to the speed increase will be capacity, organizers say. That means it will carry more data at any given time than the group’s present backbone network, and that will reduce congestion.
“The really heavy users in the network, the researchers, are going to be the first people that recognize the benefit,” says Chris Robb, network operations manager at Internet2.
Roughly two thirds of the funding for the $97-million project comes from federal stimulus funds announced last summer to expand broadband access nationally.
A coast-to-coast network that will connect New York, Washington, D.C., Chicago, and Sunnyvale, Calif., is expected to be finished this summer, Mr. Robb says, with connecting networks to come soon after.
He says Internet2′s national network connects with various regional networks across the country to expand access to hospitals, K-12 schools, and police and fire departments. Many of these regional networks have also received stimulus funds to enhance their capacity, which will allow them to handle the extra bandwith provided by the Internet2 network.
The network will be built using existing lines owned by Level 3 Communications, based in Broomfield, Colo.
Both Internet2 and Level 3 will monitor the fiber-optic network to protect against outages. Recently, the Internet was shut off in Georgia and Armenia when a Georgian woman allegedly severed a fiber-optic cable, thinking it was copper wire.
