JANET supports the Big Bang experiment to understand the orgins of the Universe

JANET supports the Big Bang experiment to understand origins of the universe

As the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) begins its work to re-create the ‘big bang’ at the CERN facility in Switzerland, JANET prepares to play its part in the worldwide distribution of the five gigabytes per second of data that will be pumped out of the site.

Due to the huge amounts of data generated by the experiments, this will be distributed among a number of collaborating organisations via the LHC Computing Grid (LCG). To avoid a bottleneck during the transfer of this information, the Grid handles the data from the experiments in stages - from CERN, data is transferred to 11 Tier 1 sites across North America, Asia and Europe. The data is then distributed to 140 regional Tier 2 sites based around the world; these are typically at universities or major national laboratories. <

The Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL) at Harwell in Oxfordshire is one of the Tier 1 sites. Data will be carried end to end on a dedicated lightpath from CERN to RAL using the GEANT and JANET networks.

"We are pleased to be part of such an important project as the LCG," says Jeremy Sharp, Head of Strategic Technologies. "JANET has its origins in the research community and continues to address the requirements for international collaboration at ever-increasing network capacities."