CC-NIE Network Infrastructure: Wayne State University

Wayne State University, Detroit MI

Investigators

Abstract

This project upgrades the computer network infrastructure for science at Wayne State University. It has two major components. The first builds a dedicated high speed connection from the main generators of science network traffic, physicists who collaborate on international projects in particle, nuclear, and astrophysics, computer scientists working on high speed networking, and biomedical researchers sequencing genes, to the campus computing center where existing high speed links to national science networks terminate. Second the local network infrastructure in the Wayne State Physics Building is upgraded to modern standards as already in place in Computer Science and the Wayne State School of Medicine. The project eases current and enables future national and international scientific collaboration that increasingly require sharing of large amounts of data and secure network communication. For example, Wayne State plans to build a LHC Tier-3 farm to process and analyze LHC data at Wayne State, connect Wayne State Computer Science to the National GENI network using Openflow, and complete a joint venture between the Wayne State Applied Genomics Technology Center and a European firm to do gene sequencing of commercial interest in return for research use of the generated data. A dedicated Wayne State Science Network will also enable more effective use on campus of modern desktop based videoconferencing and data sharing tools.