News for and about the Internet2 community

[Greg Wood <>]

FIRST TRANS EUROPEAN USE OF 10 GBPS ETHERNET WAN PHY SUPPORTING 5.4 GBPS 
SUSTAINED SINGLE STREAM AND 9.2 GBPS MULTI-STREAM PC TO PC TRAFFIC

Utrecht 2 October - CERN, SURFnet and the University of Amsterdam 
announced that they have succeeded in building and testing a Trans 
European 10 Gbps Ethernet (10 GE) network. Crossing four countries and 
spanning 1700 km, the network uses the new 10 GE WAN PHY transmission 
technology capable of transmitting the equivalent of 1.5 complete data 
CDs every second. The CERN Amsterdam connection was used by researchers 
from the ATLAS experiment and the University of Amsterdam to transfer a 
single TCP data stream between a pair of high-end server PCs at 5.4 
Gbps, a rate limited by the PCs hardware and software. Using two PCs at 
each end it was shown possible to utilize the full data bandwidth (9.2 
Gbps) of the CERN to Amsterdam connection. The results are an important 
milestone in exploring the high-speed distribution of data from CERN's 
new Large Hadron Collider, scheduled to come into operation in 2007.

The network consisted of a SURFnet OC-192 lambda between Amsterdam and 
Geneva delivered by Global Crossing. The setup was first tested for 90 
hours using IXIA network testers. This equipment proved the stability 
and raw performance of the network by transporting 365 TBytes of raw 
data without any bit error or packet loss. In subsequent tests Force10 
switch/routers were connected directly to the DWDM equipment using two 
10 Gbps WAN PHY interfaces. Another setup included Cisco ONS 15454 
Multiservice Optical Platforms in the path. For test purposes several HP 
Itanium and Xeon systems were connected on both sides equipped with 
Intel 10 Gbps Ethernet network interface cards.

The University of Amsterdam and high energy physics research institute 
NIKHEF collaborate with SURFnet to build advanced data transport 
infrastructure using lightpaths. This infrastructure will aid the 
distribution of the experiment data from the LHC experiments at CERN to 
researchers in remote institutes via the data replication centres of 
which NIKHEF will be a node.

The 10 GE WAN PHY technology permits Ethernet frames to be carried 
across existing SONET/SDH infrastructures. It effectively extends the 
span of an Ethernet network across countries and continents. Long haul 
Ethernets of the type demonstrated between CERN and Amsterdam can offer 
significant cost advantages as they use cheaper and fewer components 
than traditional alternatives, in particular when the 10 GE WAN PHY is 
directly connected to DWDM equipment, as has been shown in some of these 
tests. The Ethernet everywhere approach nicely augments the emerging 
optical demonstrators at NetherLight, StarLight and CANARIE, and the 
existing router based general Internet infrastructure.

The current successful demonstration of the 10 GE WAN PHY in the field 
has been built on earlier interoperability testing carried out by 
CANARIE, Carleton University and CERN in the laboratory this summer.

Bob Dobinson from CERN said: "Over the last decades we have seen 
Ethernet become the predominant local area network standard. Now we see 
the use of Ethernet at the Trans European level. "Ethernet everywhere" 
is a not inappropriate slogan for the future world of networking. This 
could be a significant development for the ATLAS experiment."

Kees Neggers, Managing Director of SURFnet, applauds the results. 
"SURFnet is pioneering with 'hybrid' networking since early 2002 via the 
NL GigaPort project. This work by CANARIE, CERN and University of 
Amsterdam is an excellent demonstration of the potential of lambda 
services for science applications and yet another step in the 
development of GLIF, the emerging Global Lambda Integrated Facility."

Cees de Laat, associate professor at the University of Amsterdam 
comments: "This is a very important step in proving the feasibility of 
building a services oriented network where adequate equipment is used to 
deliver the best price-performance for the requirements of the GRID 
users. Using router-based infrastructures only at these speeds would 
turn out to be too expensive."

Bill St. Arnaud, CANARIE commented: "The present tests are a step 
towards extending the Internet end-to-end principle to circuit-based 
networks. Soon high-end GRID applications will have sufficient traffic 
volume to require their own lightpaths, complementing the standard 
routed network. Ethernet over lightpaths is a technology that may allow 
significant cost savings while providing an increased level of 
flexibility for such scenario."

The tests were made possible by support from the following 
manufacturers, who have generously contributed their equipment and know 
how: Force10, IXIA, Hewlett Packard, Cisco, Intel, Global Crossing. We 
acknowledge the support of: EU projects ESTA (IST-2001-33182) and 
DataTAG (IST-2001-32459), NL GigaPort project, CERN OpenLAB, NIKHEF and 
SARA.

SURFnet

SURFnet operates and innovates the national research network in The
Netherlands, to which 150 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. Currently SURFnet's network innovation is funded by the Dutch 
government via the GigaPort project. For more information please visit
www.surfnet.nl.

CERN

CERN is the European Laboratory for Particle Physics, one of the world's
most prestigious centres for fundamental research. The laboratory is
currently building the Large Hadron Collider. The most ambitious 
scientific undertaking the world has yet seen, the LHC will collide tiny 
fragments of matter head on to unravel the fundamental laws of nature. 
It is due to switch on in 2007 and will be used to answer some of the 
most fundamental questions of science by some 7,000 scientists from 
universities and laboratories all around the world.

University of Amsterdam

The Advanced Internet Research group of the University of Amsterdam's
Faculty of Science researches new architectures and protocols for the
Internet. It actively participates in world-wide standardisation
organisations Internet Engineering Task Force and the Global Grid Forum.
The group conducts experiments with extremely high-speed network
infrastructures. The Institute carries out groundbreaking research in 
the fields of security, authorisation, authentication and accounting for 
Grid environments. The Institute is developing a virtual laboratory 
based on Grid technology for e-science applications. For more 
information please visit www.science.uva.nl/research/air.

CANARIE

CANARIE is Canada's advanced Internet organization, a not-for-profit
corporation that facilitates the development and use of next-generation
research networks and the applications and services that run on them. By
promoting collaboration among key sectors and by partnering with similar
initiatives around the world, CANARIE stimulates innovation and growth 
and helps to deliver social, cultural, and economic benefits to all 
Canadians. CA*net 4, Canada's national research and innovation network, 
is developed and operated by CANARIE. CANARIE positions Canada as the 
global leader in advanced networking, and is supported by its members, 
project partners, and the Government of Canada.

NetherLight

NetherLight is an experimental optical Internet interconnection point in
Amsterdam that is being realised by SURFnet within the context of the
GigaPort project. Research networks and institutes in the Netherlands 
and abroad can connect their lambdas in order to research models and 
techniques for future generations of optical Internet Exchanges.

DataTAG

The DataTAG is a project co-funded by the European Union, the U.S.
Department of Energy, and the National Science Foundation.  It is led by
CERN together with four other partners.  The project brings together the
following European leading research agencies: Italy's Instituto 
Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN), France's Institut National de 
Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (INRIA), the UK's Particle 
Physics and Astronomy Research Council (PPARC), and Holland's University 
of Amsterdam (UvA).  The DataTAG project is very closely associated with 
the European Union DataGrid project, the largest grid project in Europe 
also led by CERN.  For more information, http://www.datatag.org


-------------------------
Contact information:
SURFnet
Mariska Herweijer
phone: +31 30 2305305
e-mail: 


University of Amsterdam
Dr.ir. Cees de Laat
Phone: +31 20 5257590
e-mail: 


CERN
Bob Dobinson
Phone: +41 22 767 3066
e-mail: 


CANARIE
Bill St.Arnaud
Phone: +1 613 944-5603
e-mail: 


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