June 1, 1999

The Electronic Visualization Laboratory (EVL) at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) has received a major award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to facilitate the connection of National Research Networks (NRNs) in several European countries and Israel to the NSF-sponsored advanced network, the vBNS.  The consortium, "EuroLink," consists of EVL and four charter NRNs--NORDUnet (Nordic countries Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden), SURFnet (The Netherlands), RENATER2  (France), and Israel's InterUniversity Computation Center (IUCC) network consortium.  Over the four-year award period, other European networks will be added as appropriate. Recently, the CERN physics institute in Switzerland has taken the necessary steps to connect with the vBNS and will most likely join the consortium in the coming year.

Recent and rapid evolution of the Internet has led to vastly increased expectations by university scientists and engineers for bandwidth, quality of service (QoS), and connectivity. Science and engineering applications expect to use technologies such as remote instrumentation control, virtual reality, tele-immersion, real-time client server systems, multimedia, tele-teaching, tele-medicine, and digital video, as well as distributed computing and high-throughput, high-priority data transfers. These applications and underlying technologies depend on end-to-end delivery of multi-tens-of-megabits bandwidth with QoS control.

Countries worldwide are building next-generation networks to meet these demands.  NSF, to encourage the interconnection of US advanced networks with foreign networks so American researchers can collaborate with remote colleagues worldwide, initiated the High Performance International Internet Services (HPIIS) program.  This program provides funds to help defray international connectivity costs.  EuroLink is one of three consortia receiving funds from this program. The others, created last year, are TransPAC, a consortium of Indiana University and APAN (Asian Pacific Advanced Network group: Japan, Singapore, Australia, Korea), and MIRnet, a consortium of the University of Tennessee and Russia.

EuroLink, TransPAC and MIRnet networks connect to the vBNS through the Science, Technology and Research Transit Access Point [STAR TAP ^SM ] in Chicago, Illinois. The vBNS, begun in 1995, is a federal investment of $50 million in a five-year project with MCI Telecommunications Corporation.  University connections to this sophisticated network are evaluated by a peer review process and approved based on scientific and technical merit.  Expected to remain several steps ahead of commercially available networking, the vBNS currently runs at 622 million bits per second and has begun a transition to operation at 2.4 gigabits per second (2400 Mbps).

Launched in 1997, the STAR TAP anchors the vBNS international connections program and is a persistent proving ground for international high-performance networking.  A significant number of high performance international research and education networks now connect to U.S. networks at the STAR TAP, and several new connections will be made before year's end.  STAR TAP is operated by Ameritech Advanced Data Services, and managed by the Electronic Visualization Laboratory at University of Illinois at Chicago and Argonne National Laboratory.

UIC's EVL is a graduate research laboratory specializing in virtual reality and real-time interactive computer graphics; it is a joint effort of UIC's College of Engineering and School of Art and Design, and represents the oldest formal collaboration between engineering and art in the country offering graduate degrees to those specializing in visualization.  Having received recognition for developing the CAVE® and ImmersaDesk ^TM virtual reality systems, EVL's current research focus is "tele-immersion"--having users in different locations around the world collaborate over high-speed networks in shared, virtual environments as if they were together in the same room.  EVL receives major funding from NSF.