The Research and Education Advanced Network New Zealand Ltd. (REANNZ), formerly known as the Kiwi Advanced Research and Education Network (KAREN), is a high-capacity, high-speed
national research and education network
A national research and education network (NREN) is a specialised internet service provider dedicated to supporting the needs of the research and education communities within a country.
It is usually distinguished by support for a high-speed backb ...
(NREN) connecting
New Zealand
New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...
's tertiary institutions, research organisations, libraries, schools, museums, and the rest of the world. REANNZ is a
Crown-owned non-profit company.
Commissioned in late 2006, REANNZ links to other established regional and national research and education networks, notably to
JANET
Janet may refer to:
Names
* Janet (given name)
Surname
* Charles Janet (1849–1932), French engineer, inventor and biologist, known for the Left Step periodic table
* Jules Janet (1861–1945), French psychologist and psychotherapist
* Maur ...
in the UK and to the Pacific Northwest Gigapop in Seattle.
E-research
New Zealand researchers and educators can use REANNZ to participate in
e-research
The term e-Research (alternately spelled eResearch) refers to the use of information technology to support existing and new forms of research. This extends cyber-infrastructure practices established in Science, technology, engineering, and mathem ...
:
* to exchange large volumes of data quickly
* to gain access to large-scale national and international infrastructure
* to collaborate better on research and education projects at a distance.
REANNZ aims to:
* Enable leading-edge e-research
* Facilitate universal connectivity throughout the New Zealand and international research and education communities
* Encourage broad participation by the research and education sector in New Zealand through accessible technology and reasonable pricing
* Connect the research and education sector to the broader innovation community for pre-commercial research and development based collaboration
* Facilitate participation by multiple telecommunications-sector
partners to ensure the greatest possible flexibility for ongoing evolution
Topology
REANNZ consists of a high-speed optical network connecting
points of presence
A point of presence (PoP) is an artificial demarcation point or network interface point between communicating entities. A common example is an ISP point of presence, the local access point that allows users to connect to the Internet with their ...
(PoPs) throughout New Zealand. A PoP provides an interconnection point between member sites around the network. Members may connect at one or more POPs. REANNZ links universities and
Crown Research Institutes within New Zealand via
One NZ (Vodafone) fibre-optic cable
A fiber-optic cable, also known as an optical-fiber cable, is an assembly similar to an electrical cable but containing one or more optical fibers that are used to carry light. The optical fiber elements are typically individually coated with p ...
and Vocus Communications, at speeds up to 100 gigabits per second.
International links to Sydney and to Seattle (Pacific Northwest
Gigapop) via the
Hawaiki Cable connect REANNZ to other national research and education networks in Australia and the United States, and through them to Asia and Europe for Research and Education traffic.
A distinguishing feature of any NREN is its flexibility to meet the diverse needs of all its users. The numbers involved, coupled with increasing sophistication of personal applications, mean that managing demand and maintaining performance require the use of a hybrid Ethernet and Internet Protocol (IP) network architecture.
Uptake
The research community, driven by the development of various e-science
grid
Grid, The Grid, or GRID may refer to:
Space partitioning
* Regular grid, a tessellation of space with translational symmetry, typically formed from parallelograms or higher-dimensional analogs
** Grid graph, a graph structure with nodes connec ...
s, has developed large-scale applications that will individually use high amounts of bandwidth and can in some cases also have strict demands on the network that may require defined resources allocated temporarily to meet performance demands.
REANNZ will need to continually evolve so the range of production and development demands can co-exist. This means taking into account the collaborative nature of the development, and research processes, and therefore the need to deliver both advanced network services and associated development facilities to participating organisations.
, 86 organisations at 66 sites across New Zealand had connections to REANNZ.
See also
*
TuiaNet
References
* Claire Le Couteur. "Introducing KAREN". ''e.nz magazine'' Volume 8/4, July/August 2007
External links
NZNEES Earthquake Simulation, University of Auckland
{{Authority control
Academic computer network organizations
Education in New Zealand
Internet in New Zealand