Scientific
Applications:
NEW RECORD SET AT IGRID2002 FOR
MOVING INFORMATION
At the iGRID2002 conference, a new record has been set for moving information
across the Atlantic over high performance networks. The record was set by
using a novel technique - Photonic Data Services (PDS), which were recently
developed jointly by the Laboratory for Advanced Computing / The National
Center for Data Mining (LAC/NCDM) at the University of Illinois at Chicago and
the International Center for Advanced Internet Research (iCAIR) at
Northwestern University. The biennial iGrid (International Grid) event is
dedicated to showcasing leading-edge applications enabled by global high-
performance networks. iGrid presents the latest developments in these
areas.
Using PDS, data was transported over 2.8 Gbps (Gigabits/sec - 1000 times one
million bits per second) as part of a data mining application. The goal of
data mining is to find patterns in extremely large volumes of data. This
demonstration was the first for PDS and shows the potential for data mining
applications to drive the use of available telecommunications bandwidth.
Despite the wide availability of optical fiber -- by some estimates only 3% of
the current fiber optics is currently used -- moving data effectively over
long distances is still a major problem, for example, across the United States
or the Atlantic. PDS was used to send data over 500x faster than conventional
methods using TCP (the standard protocol used to send internet data).
PDS consists of innovative integration of four separate protocols:
- the DataSpace Transfer Protocol (DSTP), the basis for data webs, which is
layered over
- SABUL, a high bandwidth network protocol, which is layered over
- IP, the standard Internet protocol, which is layered over
- Photonic Path Services. With the SABUL protocol, data can be reliably sent
at maximum speed - fully utilizing the network. DSTP and SABUL were developed
by the Laboratory for Advanced Computing at UIC, while the Photonic Path
Services were developed by iCAIR at Northwestern.
"By combining SABUL with the DSTP protocol for remote data analysis and
distributed data mining and layering them over Photonic Path Services, it is
now possible to analyze Gigabyte size data sets anywhere in the world," said
Robert Grossman, Director of the Laboratory for Advanced Computing and
National Center for Data Mining at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
"Photonic Path Services allow an application to create specialized, high
performance network connections on demand. For the first time these types of
connections will be available to large scale global applications," said Joe
Mambretti, Director of iCAIR at Northwestern University.
This type of data communication service can be used by multiple types of
industries including bioinformatics, financial services, geosciences,
computational research and industrial design. This experiment demonstrated
high performance, end-to-end, data streaming between the StarLight facility in
Chicago to SARA Reken-en Netwerkdiensten, in Amsterdam, a Dutch national
expertise centre in the field of High-Performance Computing and High-
Performance Networking.
www.northwestern.edu
iGRID2002
iGrid 2002, the 3rd biennial International Grid applications-driven
testbed event, is organized by the GigaPort Project (Netherlands), Amsterdam
Science & Technology Centre, SARA Computing and Networking Services
(Netherlands), Universiteit van Amsterdam's Science Faculty, Argonne National
Laboratory/ Mathematics and Computer Science Division (USA), Indiana
University/ Office of the vice president for Information Technology (USA),
Northwestern University/International Center for Advanced Internet Research
(iCAIR) (USA), and the University of Illinois at Chicago/ Electronic
Visualization Laboratory (USA), with funding from The Netherlands' National
Computer Facilities (NWO/NCF) and the USA's National Science Foundation.
www.igrid2002.org
StarLight
StarLight, the optical STAR TAP, is an advanced optical infrastructure and
proving ground for network services optimized for high-performance
applications. StarLight, funded by the National Science Foundation, is being
developed by the Electronic Visualization Laboratory (EVL) at the University
of Illinois at Chicago, the International Center for Advanced Internet
Research (iCAIR) at Northwestern University, and the Mathematics and Computer
Science Division at Argonne National Laboratory, in partnership with Canada's
CANARIE and Holland's SURFnet.
www.startap.net/starlight
SURFnet
SURFnet operates and innovates the national research network, to which two
hundred institutions in higher education and research in the Netherlands are
connected. To remain in the lead SURFnet puts in a sustained effort to improve
the infrastructure and to develop new applications to give users faster and
better access to new Internet services.
SURFnet Netherlands www.surfnet.nl
National Center for Data Mining, University of Illinois, at Chicago
The National Center for Data Mining (NCDM) at the University
of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) was established in 1998 to serve as a national
resource for high performance and distributed data mining. The Center sponsors
research projects, standards, testbeds, and outreach. The Center is
coordinating the development of the Predictive Model Markup Language (PMML),
the standard for data mining models, and sponsoring the Terra Wide Data Mining
Testbed, a worldwide testbed for high performance and distributed data
mining.accelerates leading-edge innovation and enhanced global communications
through advanced Internet technologies, in partnership with the international
community, and national partners, including EVL at the University of
Illinois.
www.ncdm.uic.edu
www.sara.nl
www.mcs.anl.gov
The International Center for Advanced Internet Research, Northwestern
University Northwestern University's International Center for Advanced
Internet Research:
iCAIR www.icair.org
CANARIE www.canarie.ca
JAPAN Asia Pacific www.apan.net
CERN Europe www.cern.ch
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