Telecom Lead America: Ciena Corporation, a provider of packet optical network solutions, announced that CANARIE, Canada’s Advanced Research and Innovation Network, has selected Ciena to expand the 100G (100 Gigabits per second) research and education network.
CANARIE has deployed Ciena’s 6500 Packet-Optical Platform equipped with third generation WaveLogic Coherent Optical Processors to support the 100G upgrade and network expansion of a route connecting Montreal and New York.
The new ultra-high-speed network link will sustain the “big data” streams used in today’s advanced academic and scientific research. For example, the 100G link can allow a full two hour HD movie to download in 4/10ths of a second.
Spanning across Canada – from Victoria, BC to St John’s, NL – CANARIE’s network connects more than 89 universities, 101 colleges, 47 CEGEPS, 127 provincial and federal government labs and research parks, 62 hospitals and health networks, 24 cultural institutions, thousands of K-12 schools, 12 provincial and territorial optical network partners, and more than 100 international peer networks in 80 countries.
Last year, CANARIE experienced 83 percent growth in data traffic, going from 46,149 Terabytes to 84,630 Terabytes in just twelve months. Much of this data comes from “big data” projects like the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Europe, where they recently discovered proof for the existence of the Higgs’ boson particle.
Canada’s TRIUMF facility in Vancouver is a Tier-1 data site for the LHC computing grid and uses the CANARIE network to transfer data to and from the other sites.
The upgraded Montreal to New York link will provide high-performance optical transport to enable the delivery of big data streams and foster greater scientific collaboration – both in-region and internationally – for key Canadian research and education centers that are working on projects including everything from particle physics to genomics and neuroscience.
“Ciena has been a critical research and technology partner to CANARIE for more than two decades. CANARIE’s fiber optic networks and Ciena’s optical technologies are invisible to end users, but this infrastructure is absolutely critical to enabling academics, scientists and researchers to leverage global big data resources to create new knowledge and new opportunities for innovation,” said Jim Roche, president and CEO of CANARIE.
Also read: Ciena adds new packet capabilities to 6500 Packet-Optical platform
