Keeping up with the RONses

Mark Johnson

Internet2 Member Meeting

May 3, 2005

Facilities-based networks

• Regional networks can afford the first lambda

• Evolution from point solutions (gigapops) to network solutions (RONs)

• Return to circuit-based systems– Telco hierarchy -> ATM PVCs -> Light Paths

Why do we want to do this?

• Underlying assumption that big science needs big performance

• Ever increasing importance of collaboration, particularly international

• Cost control/avoidance for commodity services

• Lambda envy• Scaling

BW requirements

#users

C

A

B

ADSL GigE

A. Lightweight users, browsing, mailing, home use

Need full Internet routing, one to many

B. Business applications, multicast, streaming, VPN’s, mostly LAN

Need VPN services and full Internet routing, several to several + uplink

C. Special scientific applications, computing, data grids, virtual-presence

Need very fat pipes, limited multiple Virtual Organizations, few to few

ΣA ≈ 20 Gb/s

ΣB ≈ 40 Gb/s

ΣC >> 100 Gb/s

Impact of e-Science and Grids on Networks*

• Several lambda networks being deployed to support growing demand from eScience– SURFnet 6, UKlight, NorduLight, Geant 2, NLR, Ultralight, etc

• E-science and grid application have bandwidth needs far exceed that of production IP networks

• Most entail global collaboration and linkages• Canadian astronomy – 100 Terabytes per month• TRIUMF High energy physics – 5 Gbps continuous to CERN• Canada Light Source synchrotron – 1 to 2 Gbps per beam line• Ultra video conferencing McGill – 3.5 Gbps• Hyugens-Cassini eVLBI – 1Gbps• Merlin UK eVLBI – 320 GBps

*from Bill St Arnaud

The World Is Flat• Typical competitors for RON members are not

– Boston, Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, …

• The competition is global– Bangalore, Mumbai, Shanghai, Seoul, …

• Costs of information flow– are approaching zero

• Global economic winners will – have a better trained workforce– have the ability to participate globally– be horizontally, not vertically integrated

• nobody is best at everything

So What’s Happening?

• At least 26 RON projects in 40+ states• Nearly 30,000 miles of fiber collectively• Providing:

– Internet / Internet2 access• Peering for R&E and commodity

– Circuits (often gigabit Ethernet)• Overlay networks

• Lots of learning the stuff the telcos know– FIT values, TL-1, etc

NLR Infrastructure

• Not a single network but a set of facilities, capabilities and services to build both experimental and production networks at various layers, allowing members to acquire dedicated (project specific) facilities or shared (community specific) facilities as appropriate.

Facilities-Based Regional Optical Networks

ORNLCogent

Abilene

SoX

ESNET

ATDNETMAX

MAE-East

COGENT

ESNET