A new showcase for optical networking technology is beginning to light up, offering a test bed for research that could help spark a fire under the moribund industry.

The National LambdaRail (NLR) project is linking universities across the United States in an all-optical network consisting of thousands of miles of fiber. NLR's research focus--and potential future impact on the commercial market--are leading some networking experts to make comparisons between the project and the early investments that led to the Internet itself.

Last month, NLR completed the first full East-West phase of deployment, which included links between Denver and Chicago, Atlanta and Jacksonville, and Seattle and Denver. Phase two, which is expected to be complete by May or June 2005, will cover the southern region of the United States. This part of the project will link universities from Louisiana, Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona, Salt Lake City and New York.

"The National LambdaRail is the next step in the natural evolution of research and education in data communications," said Tom West, chief executive of the National LambdaRail. "For the first time, researchers
will actually own underlying infrastructure, something that is crucial in developing advanced science applications and network research."

The problem that has faced the research community since the commercialization of the Internet is that they have become beholden to commercial carriers that own the fiber and basic infrastructure of the communications networks. They are often forced to sign multiyear contracts that exceed their research needs. And because researchers don't own the access to the fundamental building blocks of the network, they can't conduct cutting-edge experiments on the network itself.

Now, for the first time in years, experts say, researchers once again have full access to a research network, providing unmatched opportunities to push networking technology forward.

"LambdaRail is creating the ARPAnet all over again," said Scot Colburn, a network engineer at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, which plans to hook into LambdaRail next year. "People in the academic community will now be able to play with the protocols and the basic infrastructure in a way they can't do now."

In theory, researchers using a dedicated 10gbps wavelength, or "lambda," from NLR should be able to transmit hundreds of gigabytes of data at 10gbps without much problem. While most researchers don't yet need that
kind of capacity, some are already looking forward to applications that could take advantage of a high-speed, dedicated network.

For example, at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, researchers are developing new climate models that incorporate more complex chemical interactions, extensions into the stratosphere, and
biogeochemical processes.

Verification of these processes involves a comparison with observational data, which may not be stored at NCAR. Researchers plan to use NLR to access remote computing and data resources, said Jeff Kiehl, chairman of the Community Climate System Model Scientific Steering Committee for NCAR.

The Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center, which was the first research group to connect to LambdaRail in November 2003, is using the LambdaRail infrastructure instead of a connection from a commercial provider to
connect to the National Science Foundation's Teragrid facility in Chicago.