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Fiber Optic Cable
Fiber optic cables consist of multiple, thin and flexible glass rods or fibers bundled together inside a plastic sheath. Each glass fiber is capable of transmitting data signals, voice, and video over long distances at very high speeds. Since signals are sent via light pulses instead of electricity, the fiber optic cable can transmit lots of information at a high quality without electrical interferences.
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2005 NEWS AND HIGHLIGHTS
08.24.05 - New Fiber Optic Cable to Enable High-Performance Connection from
NASA Ames to Key Research Locations
Collaborating with the Corporation for Education Network Initiatives in California (CENIC) and the Ames Gateway Facility, the NASA Research and Engineering Network (NREN) has installed a new 10-kilometer long, 72-strand fiber optic cable between NASA Ames and the Level 3 Communications, Inc. facility in Sunnyvale, Calif. The new cable's "dark fiber" (fiber that has been laid, but is not in use) will be activated with low-cost, high-performance networking equipment.
The newly laid fiber optic cable will enable higher performance communications between Ames and other research locations, helping facilitate future NASA mission networking needs, including the support of hurricane prediction applications from the Modeling, Analysis, and Prediction Program.
Many of NASA's large modeling and simulation problems require geographically distributed investigators, computing resources, and data. Networking systems will be vital to support these remotely located researchers with reliable access to high-end computing, simulation, and massive data distribution capabilities. Thus, it is imperative to continue developing methodologies to increase network bandwidth for NASA applications -- installation of this fiber will help facilitate this development.
With data transmission speeds currently at one gigabit per second (Gb/s) and a planned upgrade to 10 Gb/s connections and beyond, the fiber is dedicated to enabling high-speed network connections between Ames and CENIC's California Research and Education Network (CalREN)
Future connections will also include cross-country wide area network connections via the National Lambda Rail (NLR) and provide high-speed network connections to the NASA Research and Education advanced networking community. In addition, the fiber will allow peering (exchange of Internet traffic between consenting peers/Internet Service Providers), in this case, between Ames and CalREN's networks, and other government and research sites associated with Ames.
+ More about the CalREN and NASA Ames networking project.
Related Links
+ NASA Research and Education Network
+ Corporation for Education Network Initiatives in California (CENIC)
+ Level 3 Communications
+ CENIC's California Research and Education Network (CalREN)
+ National Lambda Rail
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NEWS ARCHIVE
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