This project establishes a new Science DMZ network infrastructure with increased bandwidth (UCI LightPath) at the University of California, Irvine to address the increasing demand for bandwidth and data-transfer performance within and beyond campus. The project also implements a new 10Gbps link from campus to the High Performance Research tier of the California Research and Education Network (CalREN-HPR) to boost science data transfer and analysis. Together these improvements to the networking infrastructure significantly enhance and expedite scientific data transfer by avoiding bottlenecks and potential performance impacting devices in the data-transfer path. The project allows campus IT personnel to explore and deploy new technologies such as the Software Defined Network (SDN) and IPv6, and to collaborate with researchers to better support their research activities.
The improved Science DMZ network infrastructure directly impacts a variety of cutting-edge data intensive research efforts across campus by enabling more complex modeling and analysis of big data sets, and facilitating data exchange among collaborative research groups in the areas of Experimental Particle Physics at the Large Hadron Collider, Genomics and Bioinformatics, Hydrologic Modeling and Remote Sensing, Flow and Combustion Dynamics of Liquid Fuels, Biomolecular Simulations, Climate Modeling, and Cosmology.
This project integrates IT research and education through an organized IT work-study program in the Office of Information Technology, which provides a platform to train future network engineers and operators. The project also supports existing K-12 outreach programs by enabling the transfer of data created in the lab to the programs for use in their curricula.
