Nevada Research Network EPSCoR Grant (Award 9871974) Final Report

EPSCoR Grant (Award 9871974) Final Report

Project Participants

What People Have Worked on the Project?
Jane A. Nichols
Principal Investigator
Steven Zink
CoPrincipal Investigator
Davan Weddle
CoPrincipal Investigator
Lori L. Temple
CoPrincipal Investigator
Lyle Pritchett
CoPrincipal Investigator
Ed Anderson
Senior personnel
Sally Phares
Senior personnel
Joseph Lombardo
Senior personnel
Jeff Wolff
Technician, programmer
Lou Grandieri
Technician, programmer
Allan Webber
Technician, programmer
Garrett Mead
Technician, programmer
Dick Belaustegui
Technician, programmer
Richard Jarvis
UCCSN Chancellor
Thomas Anderes
UCCSN Interim Chancellor
What Other Organizations Have Been Involved as Partners?
Williams Fiber
Nevada Power
Sierra Power
CENIC
Nevada Department of Transportation
Nevada State Department of Information Technology
Have you had other collaborators or contacts?
Nevada State Attorney General's Office
Brooks Fiber (Reno, NV)
Sprint (Anaheim, CA)
Qwest (Anaheim and Sacramento, CA)
NLANR technical group (NCSA, Urbana-Champaign, IL)
Dan VanBellegham (EPSCoR)
Ken Bishop (Kentucky)
William Decker (NSF)
Russ Hobby (CENIC group, CA)
Pat Murphy (Cisco, Las Vegas, NV)
Tom Perkins (Cisco, Las Vegas, NV)

Activities and Findings
This section will serve as your report to your program officer of your project's activities and findings. Please describe what you have done and what you have learned, broken down into four categories:

Describe the major research and education activities of the project.
Activities during year one focused on the engineering aspects of the Nevada Research Network infrastructure and negotiations with service providers for fiber connectivity. All in-state networking equipment was purchased under an EPSCoR grant, and configuration and testing was completed at the SCS Reno office. Equipment is installed at UNR, UNLV, and DRI campuses, and fiber upgrade projects are complete to allow campus connections to SCS. Negotiations with Williams Fiber, Nevada Power, Sierra Power, Qwest, Sprint, and CENIC are completed for long-haul and last-mile OC3 service between SCS Las Vegas and Reno offices to the CENIC network at Anaheim and Sacramento, California, respectively. The only expenditures on CISE funds so far this year are for border routers between the long-haul carrier and the NRN infrastructure.
Year two activities have revolved around implementation efforts. Purchases included the fiber optic termination equipment for the last mile facilities and cards and fiber distribution panels for the intra-campus connections. All equipment has been installed. The last mile construction in Reno and Las Vegas was completed by Sierra Pacific Communications during September, 2000.
The OC3 line and equipment to the Stead facility (near Reno) was also installed. This will accommodate some early Internet 2 scientists.
Notification from Williams Communications was received that they will turn over the fiber circuits to UCCSN January 2, 2001. At that time SCS has several activities to complete including termination of the circuits, provisioning them and making the bandwidth assignments. The State of Nevada will also connect into their portion of the fiber at that time.
At the Qwest pop, final connectivity will be made by Pacific Bell, Williams and CENIC. A draft agreement with CENIC is already in place and will be executed at the appropriate time.
The ad hoc NRN Advisory Committee continues to meet approximately every 6 weeks to monitor progress and planning as well as budget tracking.
A grantee approved no-cost, one year extension was submitted October 11, 2000. This was done because the advent of the Williams Communications agreement and the subsequent last mile agreements with Nevada Power and Sierra Pacific Power required construction. The original timelines had not included an allocation for the construction process.
The final year (2002) primarily involved campus connections and the startup of several projects.
At UNLV that meant connecting four buildings to Internet 2: the Lied Library, Thomas Beam Engineering Complex-including the National Supercomputer Center for Energy and the Environment, the Robert L. Bigelow Physics Building and the Chemistry building. Individual faculty members' offices and research labs are being added to the network in these buildings as needed. A multiple use space for all users is also being constructed in each building.
UNLV has identified the next group of buildings to be connected and set priorities pending funding availability. They include: Frank and Estella Beam Hall - College of Business, Lily Fong Geoscience Building, Carlson Education Building, the Judy Bayley Theatre, Alta Ham Fine Arts Building - Black Box Theatre and the Flora Duncan Humanities - UNLV TV Studios.
Two Access Grid node locations have been identified - one in the Lied Library and one in the Supercomputer Center - and will be available for campus use by Fall 2003.
At UNR the Harry Reid Engineering Laboratory (HREL) is fully upgraded and using I2. Other areas are being upgraded as a result of a $250,000 private donation to the University and is expected to be completed in May 2003.
Additionally, UNR is upgrading the core campus network to provide gigabit uplinks from every building on the main campus. Over 3,500 ports will be directly attached to switches with gigabit uplinks. Another 7,000 ports will be attached to 10/100 switch ports with a 100 Mbps switched connecting directly attached to a switch with a gigabit uplink. The remaining ports will be attached to shared 10/100 hubs linked to switches with 100 Mbps uplinks.
Describe the major findings resulting from these activities.
Network engineering options have been evaluated and most are now finalized.
Early activities focused on the engineering aspects of the Nevada Research Network infrastructure, negotiations with service providers, equipment purchases and required staff training. A signed contract with Williams was put into place. Verbal agreements with Sierra Power and Nevada Power for last-mile connections from Williams' POPs in Reno and Las Vegas, respectively, developed into signed contracts. Provisions for vBNS/Abilene connectivity via the CAL-REN network in California were discussed with the CENIC governing board and plans made to implement.
During year two, activities focused on completion efforts. Williams completed installation of the fiber and is turning it over January 2, 2001. A contract with Sierra Pacific Communications was put into place for the completion of the last mile arrangements in Reno and Las Vegas. Construction at both locations was completed. A draft agreement with CENIC was put into place and will soon be executed.
Intra-campus connections was made and tested including an OC3 line to Stead. In other words, everything is completed and poised for the final connectivity.
Having the Internet2 connections in final stages during 2002 has provided the impetus for several new projects that are either underway or have funding and are starting underway. We are seeing the kind of collaborative relationships develop that were hoped for at the beginning of this project.
The following is a list of exciting opportunities that have arisen from the Internet2 capability. It by no means is exhaustive.
Title: UNLV E-Health Initiative
Funding Agency: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Office for the Advancement of Telehealth (OAT)
Partners: University of Nevada School of Medicine, Department of Internal Medicine, Quest Technology, Inc., University Medical Center, Departments of Internal Medicine and Oncology, Endoscopy Pulmonary Disease Clinic, Heidelberg, Germany, British Colombia Cancer Agency, Vancouver, Canada, Sierra Pacific Communications
Abstract: The on-going telemedicine and distance education program represents a model program for the electronic delivery of health care and education. This telemedicine program will meet the needs of rural health care providers by providing access to knowledge databases and library services as well as providing interactive video conferencing. The proposed system is designed to meet the following objectives: high-quality video, user-friendly interface, reliable connections, portability, low costs and low maintenance.
The primary goals of this initiative are intended to solve the technical challenges in deploying and developing networking technologies to empower health and medical care delivery. The goals are:
1. to extend access to specialized, high-cost health care resources into rural areas of Nevada through telecommunications technology. This project will focus and help support the following three application areas:
  - remote diagnosis and consultation
  - continuing medical education and
  - medical informatics
2. in collaboration with Quest Nevada, develop a mobile clinic for cervical cancer
3. to support UNLV's DOE-sponsored project on "Medical Records Knowledge Discovery and Information Management for Radiation Workers"
4. to support the proposed UNLV Internet2 Quality-of-Service (QoS) project
5. to support Lung Fluorescence Endoscopy Databank Initiative
Title: National Institute for Advanced Technology (NIAT)
Funding Agency: U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), Quest Nevada
Partners: U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), Quest Nevada
Abstract: The National Institute for Advanced Technology (NIAT), established by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas as a center for information technology research and development and enterprise data management, will address and help resolve critical federal, state and local government information management needs. Developed through the alliance of government, education and business, the NIAT will be a national asset to help realize the full potential of U.S. information technology, and therefore obtain and maintain a lead in the critical science of knowledge management and discovery. The NIAT will be the base for a program to advance government electronic record keeping, including the need to enhance access and ensure preservation of critical environmental, scientific, medical and legal records. The program will enable data and technology sharing and information systems integration, and will both lower near-term costs, and provide substantial future cost avoidance for government agencies.
Title: NOAA:Weather Simulation and Forecasting
Funding Agency: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Special Operations and Research Division (SORD) of the Air Resources Laboratory (ARL)
Partners: same
Abstract: The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Special Operations and Research Division (SORD) of the Air Resources Laboratory (ARL) in Las Vegas collaborates with the NSCEE to run a high-resolution weather simulation model on the UNLV's SGI Supercomputer daily. The weather simulation model, the Regional Atmospheric Modeling System, or RAMS, predicts the weather for the Southwestern United States including Nevada, California, Arizona, and Utah at resolutions down to 2 kilometers. ARL/SORD uses the UNLV supercomputer capability to run atmospheric simulations at resolutions of 32, 8 and 2 km, covering the Southwestern US down to Las Vegas. These simulations are used to assist SORD forecasters prepare daily weather forecasts and to support Department of Energy projects at the Nevada Test Site for Homeland Security.
At the beginning of each model simulation, the NSCEE Computer connects, via Internet2, to computers at ARL Headquarters in Washington, DC, and downloads model initialization data fields generated by the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP).
Title: DOE/NNSA: Modeling of Radiation Detection Systems
Funding Agency: U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) Remote Sensing Lab
Partners: same
Abstract: The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) National Nuclear Security Administration's (NNSA) Remote Sensing Laboratory (RSL) in Las Vegas, Nevada, collaborates with NSCEE to run the Monte Carlo N-Particle Transport (MCNP) program to assist in equipment design and characterization. The Los Alamos National Laboratory-developed program predicts gamma, neutron and electron transport through user-defined media with a random number generator and probability distributions based on cross-section data. RSL sends input files electronically to the UNLV supercomputer, where the necessarily long run times vary from 4-24 hours. Prototype modeling using supercomputer-simulated detector response results in significant cost savings over prototype fabrication and benchmarking. Reliance on computer simulations allows designers to experiment with novel and risky configurations. Preliminary designs selected for further development can optimize individual parameters to the most cost-effective values for increasing efficiency.
At the beginning of each model simulation, the NSCEE Computer connects, via Internet2, and downloads model initialization data.
Title: Compressible Fluid Flow
Funding Agency: U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR)
Partners: Nevada Center for Advanced Computational Methods (NCACM)
Abstract: The finite element method is being employed to develop a compressible flow model that solves both the Euler Equations and viscous equations in two and three dimensions. The numerical method incorporates the use of bilinear, isoparametric, quadrilateral elements and trilinear, hexahedral elements, as well as the use of Petrov-Galerkin weighting applied to the advection terms. Mass lumping allows an explicit Euler scheme to be used in conjunction with a second-order Runge-Kutta approximation to advance the discretized equations in time. The use of h-adaptive mesh refinement increases the solution accuracy by locating shocks more efficiently than a globally fine mesh. Two-dimensional results agree well with theoretical solutions. Three-dimensional code verification is currently underway. Ultimately, chemistry effects at high Mach numbers will be examined and parallel computational methods will be incorporated.
Title: Groundwater Contaminant Transport
Funding Agency: U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR)
Partners: Nevada Center for Advanced Computational Methods (NCACM)
Abstract: GWADAPT is a finite-element model which incorporates mesh (h-) adaptation to calculate ground-water flow and pollutant transport. The formulation is based on the equations for conservation of mass, Darcy's law for an anisotropic medium, and the time-dependent species transport equation. Modifications are used in the finite-element formulation to enhance computational speed and reduce storage; Petrov-Galerkin weighting of the advection terms provides numerical stability. An explicit time marching scheme is used to solve the transient equations. By utilizing unstructured adaptive meshing, species concentration and location of steep fronts are accurately resolved, even though one begins with a coarse mesh.
Title: Outdoor Air Quality
Funding Agency: Department of Air Quality Management, Clark County, NV, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) AIRNOW
Partners: Nevada Center for Advanced Computational Methods (NCACM)
Abstract: Las Vegas is located in the southern tip of Nevada along the Colorado River. Situated in the desert environment, air, water, and visibility concerns arise in response to nature's extremes, as well as human activities. The local, state, and federal governments gathered together to form the Environmental Monitoring for Public Access and Community Tracking (EMPACT) web site, an online guide for residences to stay informed of the latest news in air, water, and visibility concerns. The EMPACT site is published at www.empact-lv.org . Air quality concerns many residences across the United States, including the Las Vegas Valley. Situated in a basin, Las Vegas is geologically enclosed, preventing proper air circulation to maintain a healthy atmosphere. Air quality received the primary focus in the past because air pollution levels exceed EPA’s unhealthful daily standards. In response to the news, a web site was developed by the Clark County Health District's Air Quality Division to display the latest news in air pollution readings, as well as access historical data. The development of the web site utilized the power of database to handle large quantities of data for easy access and reliability. CGIs were used as the interfacing medium to obtain the data when the user to the web site requested the specific data, as well as process new data that are updated every hour. The completed web site is located at http://air.cchd.org/ . Pollen counts, another issue more unique to the Las Vegas Valley, was also incorporated and updated frequently during peak pollen seasons in spring and early summer. In addition to the web site, the data collection systems were outdated and required an update. The data acquisition systems involving LabVIEW are also being developed with Visual Basic to complete the package.
Title: Indoor Air Quality
Funding Agency: N/A
Partners: Nevada Center for Advanced Computational Methods (NCACM)
Abstract: A web-based model has been developed for simulating the transport of toxic materials within rooms and building interiors. The numerical model is based on the boundary element method (BEM) coupled with a Lagrangian Particle Transport technique (LPT) utilizing the JAVA programming language. The JAVA model allows a user to simulate indoor airflow and pollutant dispersion patterns for indoor room configurations created by the user or obtained from CAD drawings. Graphical results are displayed as velocity vectors and contour plots of concentration.
Title: Niobium Cavity Design
Funding Agency: Advanced Accelerator Application/University Participation Program
Partners: Los Alamos National Laboratory, Nevada Center for Advanced Computational Methods (NCACM)
Abstract: Modeling and Optimization of the Chemical Etching Process in Niobium Cavities Niobium cavities are an important component of integrated NC/SC high-power linacs. Researchers in several countries have tested various cavity shapes and concluded that elliptically-shaped cells and buffered chemical polishing produce the best performance. The objective of this paper is to study and optomize the process on the effect of chemical etching on the surface roughness. Chemical etching of the inner surface of the cavity is achieved by circulating acid through it. The acid interacts with the surface and eliminates imperfections. During etching, the end of the cavity is blocked. A pipe with baffles is inserted within the cavity to direct the flow along the surfaces. A finite element computational fluid dynamics model is developed for the etching process. The problem is modeled as a two-dimensional, axisymmetric, steady state fluid flow problem. This model is used to study the parameters affecting the uniformity of the etching process, such as flow rate and geometry of the baffle. The model is parameterized so it can be used within an optimization program to improve quality of the surface finish.
Title: Nuclear Spent Fuel Repository Design
Funding Agency: U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Yucca Mountain Project
Partners: Nevada Center for Advanced Computational Methods (NCACM)
Abstract: Discusses the development of a thermal model for heat transfer in the potential repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, USA. The model is based on separating the calculation of the emplacement drift from the surrounding mountain rock. When ventilation of the drift is considered, the heat generated by the waste package is removed from the drift by the ventilating air and conduction through the drift wall. The heat transfer path through the rock is of less importance than that through the ventilating air, allowing zero-heat flux boundary conditions to be applied on the drift wall. The finite-volume method is used to accomplish the numerical simulation; k-e closure is used to model turbulence. Influences of such parameters as velocity of the ventilating air, thermal loading, and radiation heat transfer on the drift wall temperature are analyzed. It appears that radiation does not play an important role when ventilation is used, and does not significantly increase the drift wall temperatures.
Title: High-Performance Computing Alliance
Partners: UNLV National Supercomputing Center (NSCEE) and the University of New Mexico High Performance Computing, Education and Research Center (HPCERC).
Background: The alliance would serve as a heterogeneous, distributed problem-solving environment that would enable a group of researchers located around the world to work together on a common set of projects
Goal: The ongoing collaboration between the UNLV National Supercomputing Center for Energy and the Environment (NSCEE) and the UNM High Performance Computing, Education and Research Center (HPCERC) both support Linux super cluster environments, advanced storage and database capabilities, visualization, Access Grids and related collaborative environments including Telehealth. Both supercomputer centers are engaged with respective research faculty in visualization, imaging, modeling and simulation, data analysis and mining and other similar activities. The collaboration between UNLV and UNM through their respective supercomputer centers is an opportunity for the sharing and leveraging of additional activities to support DOE national laboratories with open computational resources and to support faculty research within the DOE laboratories.
UNR
UNR SHAKER TABLE -The University of Nevada Reno, Oregon State University in Corvallis, and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York are leading an NSF-funded network project called the George E. Brown Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES). The NEES uses the Internet2 Abilene backbone to connect earthquake engineering sites at 155Mbs per second, facilitating national collaboration between researchers that will ultimately be international in scale. The NEES consortium will help researchers improve seismic design world-wide upon its scheduled completion in September 2004. Further information is available at http://bric.ce.unr.edu/nees2/index.htm
Public television, KNPB, is exchanging high quality video with another public TV station in Boise, ID as a part of a project related to public affairs in the West.
DRI
A very notable project that involves UNR, UNLV and DRI: Advanced Computing in Environmental Sciences (ACES) funded by NSF EPSCoR.
This project involves setting up an access grid and a computational grid that will serve the higher education researchers of Nevada as well as be available to extend and connect with other grids for computational purposes.
Describe the opportunities for training and development provided by your project.
Project co-PIs and support personnel have attended a number of ATM, vBNS, IN2, Abilene, and NLANR conferences and workshops to become familiar with high-speed networking technical and policy issues.
For year one, no training or development activities is planned for campus researchers and their support staff.
During year two, activities were scheduled to help the research community understand the resource they would soon have access to.
During January 2000 DRI (north) held a lunch time information session. Topics covered included NRN, Internet 2, Abilene, UCAID, and the meaning of all of these in terms of bandwidth, the projects sited in the proposals and the tentative timeline.
Another informational event was held for the potential researchers who will use Internet 2. (See outreach activities for details).
Also during year 2, two support personnel attended the Kansas Chautauqua and one support technician attended fiber optic terminal equipment school provided by Cisco.
The research institutions have been sending researchers to the Internet2 meetings for purposes of networking and understanding more about their projects fitting into Internet2. This has been very successful during 2002 and each institution is committed to continuing this as long as funding is available to do so and it serves appropriate research purposes.
Describe outreach activities your project has undertaken.
The NRN project has maintained a Web site for informing UCCSN campuses and monitoring agencies since the original EPSCoR proposal was submitted in February, 1998. This site was moved from 'www.dri.edu/NRN' to 'www.nevada.edu/nrn' and features the original grant proposals, quarterly status reports, partnerships, engineering plans, and a list of contacts which includes the PI and co-PIs of this project.
Regular reports are made to the Vice Presidents for Research from the campuses involved and at monthly System-wide Network Connectivity meetings. In addition, network and computing staff at the three institutions are updated periodically by their NRN representatives.
On February 16 and 17, 2000 separate information sessions were held, one in Reno and one in Las Vegas, for potential researchers using Internet 2. These were the first public meetings held to give the researchers an overview and to answer questions for them. A total of 12 researchers attended from the University of Nevada, Reno, 14 researchers from the Desert Research Institute attended and 17 researchers from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas attended. Several other support personnel and administrators were also in attendance to hear Dan Van Bellingham and Dr. Ken Bishop speak. This activity generated a lot of excitement which has lead to supplemental proposals by several researchers.
Toward the end of 2002, the Nevada Research Network Advisory Committee (NRNAC), the technical planning and advisory committee that oversaw implementation of this project, was asked by the Chancellor to continue on in a capacity that will review projects with major technology components.

Publications and Products

In this section, you will be asked to describe the tangible products coming out of your project. Specifically:

What have you published as a result of this work?
Journal publications
Books or other non-periodical, one-time publications
1. What Web site or other Internet site have you created?
  www.nevada.edu/nrn is the main web site with the CISE project information available at www.nevada.edu/nrn/vbns_proposal2_final.html
2. What other specific products (databases, physical collections, educational aids, software, instruments, or the like) have you developed?
  Developed a video presentation for UCCSN public information titled Internet 2: Research Connectivity for Nevada

Contributions

Now we invite you to explain ways in which your work, your findings, and specific products of your project are significant. Describe the unique contributions, major accomplishments, invations and successes of your project relative to :

the principal discipline(s) of the project;
The principal discipline of this project is high-speed network access in support of meritorious research applications. At this time, negotiations with commercial service providers are completed, and partnerships with local power companies and state agencies beyond those specified in the proposal are well-established. By means of trading state highway rights-of-way for fiber capacity from Williams Fiber, substantial cost savings for the in-state infrastructure are being realized. Partnerships with local power companies in Reno and Las Vegas for last-mile connectivity between Williams and SCS offices are also resulting in substantial cost savings and long-term working relationships. An agreement with the CENIC group to allow connection of the NRN to vBNS/Abilene through the CAL-REN network has resulted in lower last-mile costs and a potential for closer working relationships between Nevada and California research campuses.
All of these developments result in smaller ongoing costs, ensuring the ability of UCCSN to maintain the research network connectivity after the CISE grant period ends.
other disciplines of science or engineering;
A number of campus research programs involving climate research, terawatt physics, and earthquake modeling are poised to take immediate advantage of the high-speed network as soon as it is available. To date, however, no other disciplines have yet benefited from the groundwork and preparation which were a major focus of NRN activity of the past year.
the development of human resources;
Co-PIs, members of the NRN support team, and campus researchers have attended Internet2 meetings and workshops, the Chautaqua at Kentucky and Kansas, the NLANR DAST workshop in Tucson, and Cisco ATM classes in preparation for implementing and supporting the high-speed network covered by this grant. Some of this material (e.g., distributed computing issues) has been disseminated to campus support staff and applications programmers.
the physical, institutional, or information resources that form the infrastructure for research and education; and
The entire goal of this project is to improve the information resources available to Nevada researchers. A secondary benefit is improving collaboration between Nevada research campuses and other computational resources available on the national research networks. At this time, the work is nearly complete to make these resources available, but researchers have not yet seen the benefits of this work.
other aspects of public welfare beyond science and engineering, such as commercial technology, the economy, cost-efficient environmental protection, or solutions to social problems.
The negotiations with Williams Fiber to exchange state highway right-of-way access for bandwidth will drastically reduce long-term costs to the state of Nevada. Using existing right-of-way routes reduces the environmental impact of adding fiber capacity to the state. In addition, other state agencies and departments will benefit from the availability of high-bandwidth fiber capacity at greatly reduced costs under this agreement. Given the normal economic disadvantages Nevada experiences because of geographical distances between its two major population centers, the effect of these reduced costs cannot be overstated.