Science Grid This Week

June 8, 2005

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Calendar/Meetings

JUNE

8-10, UltraLight Summer Workshop Tutorial, FIU University Park campus, Miami, Florida

8-10, 2005 Great Plains Network-MIDnet Annual Conference, Kansas City, Missouri

12-16, 11th Annual Meeting of the Organization for Human Brain Mapping, Toronto, Canada

16-17, Globus Toolkit 4 Tutorial, University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois

Full Calendar

Image of the Week

First VRVS collaborative session with one member at 12,000 meters. (Click on image for larger version.)
Courtesy VRVS

The The Virtual Room Videoconferencing System is a web-oriented system for videoconferencing and collaborative work over IP networks. On March 7, 2005, the VRVS team took advantage of the new Internet connectivity available on selected airlines and performed a high quality video/audio collaborative session with members attending from California, Slovakia, Switzerland and a Boeing 747 traveling from Los Angeles to Munich. Pictured here is a screenshot of the session, with high-flying member Phillipe Galvez of Caltech in the lower-left corner.

Statistic of the Week

216,300
216,300 terabit-meters per second is the Internet2 Land Speed Record set by a team from the University of Tokyo, the WIDE project, Chelsio Communication and other organizations in the IPv4 single and multiple stream classes. To set the record, 1485 gigabytes of data was sent over 30,000 kilometers of network in 30 minutes at an average rate of 7.21 gigabits per second.
Source: www.internet2.edu

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Feature Story

ICFA Workshop Addresses Digital Divide, Networking, Grid Computing

Korean Dinner at the International ICFA Workshop on HEP Networking, Grids, and Digital Divide Issues for Global e-Science.

Grid computing for current and future high energy physics experiments, advanced networking, the digital divide between developed and developing countries and e-science were the main topics of a workshop held May 23–27 in Daegu, South Korea. Hosted by the Centre for High Energy Physics at Kyungpook National University, the second International Committee for Future Accelerators Workshop on High Energy Physics Networking, Grid and Digital Divide Issues for Global e-Science attracted around 100 participants from 20 countries and international organizations.

"It was quite successful," said Dongchul Son, CHEP director and workshop co-chair. "We brought together people from the Asia-Pacific region and some of the world experts in the digital divide and grid computing for high energy physics. We heard status reports from many regions and many grid computing, networking and e-science projects, and heard from some new areas such as India and the Philippines."

The status of networks and computing connectivity used by the high energy physics community in many regions, advanced networking technologies, and the status and plans for worldwide high-speed networks to connect scientific institutions in many countries were a main focus of the workshop. The meeting was organized by the ICFA Standing Committee on Interregional Connectivity, which has focused on global networking and the digital divide—the difference in access to computing and technology that exists between different countries and regions—for the past three years.

"The news this week on the digital divide was mixed," said Harvey Newman from Caltech, workshop co-chair. "A long and growing list of countries has made a great deal of progress, but there are still difficulties. The most problematic region is Africa—the lack of infrastructure and skills, high import duties and other technical and political problems all contribute to most of the continent falling farther behind digitally as other nations advance faster."

Latin American, U.S. Students Connect at PASI

Students and lecturers in Mendoza, Argentina.

Students from Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and all over the United States met May 15–21 to learn about grid computing and advanced networking and their applications to high energy physics and astronomy research. The Pan-American Advanced Studies Institute on Grid Computing and Advanced Networking for E-Science, which took place in Mendoza, Argentina, gave some South American students their first exposure to grid computing and all students a chance to start building future global interdisciplinary collaborations.

"The lectures and discussions were important, but even more so was the contact with people leading grid and e-science initiatives around the world," said Sergio Novaes from the State University of Sao Paolo in Brazil. "In South America, we're a little isolated from the grid developments happening in the northern hemisphere. Bringing these leaders here is a great opportunity for us to start new relationships and collaborations."

The PASI, which included about 40 graduate students and 15 lecturers, was funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and Department of Energy. The idea for this institute, one of a series in various science and engineering disciplines, grew out of another NSF-funded project, CHEPREO, at Florida International University. Collaborations with Latin American institutions are also a part of CHEPREO, a project geared toward high energy physics research, grid computing and networking, and education.