Enhancement of Cyber Connectivity within the Nevada System of Higher Education

Nevada System Of Higher Education, Reno NV

Investigators

Abstract

Abstract Proposal Number: EPS-1006797 Proposal Title: Enhancement of Cyber Connectivity within the Nevada System of Higher Education Institution: Nevada System of Higher Education This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5). The goal of this EPSCoR Research Infrastructure Improvement Inter-Campus and Intra-Campus Cyber Connectivity project is to enhance connectivity within the Nevada System of Higher Education to achieve higher network speeds and capacity to advance education and research in Nevada. The mechanism for improved connectivity is equipment upgrades for six existing nodes on the Las Vegas metro fiber loop. Intellectual Merit The capacity improvements will provide scientists and engineers with the network resources to further build expertise in computational science, a recognized major component of the scientific enterprise. Enhanced connectivity to research universities, community and state colleges, field stations, and other academic and public entities will have broad-ranging impact on research and education enterprises throughout Nevada. Institutions will be linked to more than 200 other Internet2 universities, government research laboratories, companies, and research facilities throughout the world, facilitating data-intensive research, collaborative development, distributed experiments, grid-based data analysis, and experimentation using high performance networking, social networking, and cyber-enabled learning. Broader Impacts The award will enable Nevada to make major improvements to NevadaNet, which provides connectivity to remote areas, rural centers, small colleges and regional universities, Native American tribes and peoples, and persons with disabilities. The enhanced connectivity will connect universities with K-12 schools as well as provide for economic development and other opportunities that can result from high-bandwidth access (e.g., distance education, tele-health instruction and support, and sharing of economic and community development materials). The proposed educational programs in high performance computing will provide students, postdoctoral associates, and faculty training in computational tools that will broaden participation in, and understanding of, computational thinking and modeling in general, and climate change science in particular, and foster the next generation of cyber-literate scientists and engineers working to solve climate change and other societal problems.