Michael Zink of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department is the featured researcher in a video produced by the National Science Foundation (NSF) about the NSF-funded Global Environment for Networking Innovation (GENI) program. GENI is a fast, programmable "virtual laboratory" that enables university researchers to experiment on so-called future internets. GENI is also a key part of a White House Initiative called US Ignite, which aims to realize the potential of fast, open, next-generation networks. In the video, Zink talks about his team's use of GENI for better weather forecasting. Watch video: http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_videos.jsp?cntn_id=124472&media_id=72661&org=NSF
Using GENI as the thread, US Ignite will stitch together high-speed broadband resources to create a test bed across universities and cities throughout the United States at a national scale.
Zink and his team are demonstrating the benefits of connecting radars to ultra-high-speed networks to improve weather prediction through the Engineering Research Center for the Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere (CASA) – an application to help mitigate the impacts of natural disasters.
Zink has been involved in foundational work for GENI, helping to establish this national research and education network for exploring future internets at scale, that is, similar in size to the current Internet. Zink will serve as a lead investigator for Ignite, a virtual online laboratory that allows researchers to experiment in real time and at scale with new networks that may shape what future internets will look like.
“We've laid the groundwork for this national testbed by enabling foundational research by more than 300 researchers and 60 universities across the country to develop and prototype GENI," said Farnam Jahanian, assistant director of NSF's Directorate for Computer Information Science and Engineering. "Now, NSF will encourage the next steps for research on GENI. Experiments at-scale will transform cybersecurity, network performance, and cloud computing research, and will jumpstart applications, which have the potential for profound societal and economic impacts." (January 2013)