High Performance Networking
Synergy is essential
Synergy between network management, end user support, innovation and research is essential to SARA. The SARA network links the SARA e-Science infrastructure with the 'outside world' through SURFnet6 and NetherLight. We are involved in many national and international high-bandwidth connections between end users and the supercomputing infrastructure.
Knowledge and support
We have specific knowledge to deploy such high-demanding connections and to help the researcher with the implementation. We support researchers in using these connections for their applications in the context of e-Science support. We contribute to many international research projects to stimulate the use of high-bandwidth networks.
SARA’s network infrastructure
The e-Science infrastructure at SARA consists of, among others, computing facilities, data storage environments and visualization facilities. We make this available to our users through high-quality connections to the SURFnet6 network and the international optical exchange NetherLight. We provide high- bandwidth connections and lightpaths used by researchers who generate huge amounts of data that need to be transported to SARA. There are also connections between national and international (super)computer centers and research institutes.
Transport of large datasets
The equipment of some research institutes generates huge amounts of data that need to be transported to SARA's storage facilities. Researchers use high-bandwidth connections to display results on local, high-resolution Tiled Panel Displays. SARA supports researchers working with demanding applications by measuring and monitoring the end-to-end network performance. We provide support on the end-to-end balance and scalability. More explicitly, the balance between all system components: from storage, CPU, memory, bus and network to display. All kinds of server and network parameters must be well understood, monitored and tuned to pinpoint bottlenecks in the overall performance.
Innovation and research
We contribute to international projects and participate in international organizations to stimulate the use of high-bandwidth networks. This work enables us to provide the researcher with up-to-date knowledge in high performance networking technology. The Network Research Group at SARA presents their work on international conferences and in scientific publications.