September 5, 2006 Source: :
http://www.tru.ca/marketing/mediareleases/2006/sept.html#No.1 TRU, City, celebrate BCNET high-speed global connection KAMLOOPS - Thompson Rivers University (TRU) and community leaders in education, research and business kicked off the fall semester today with the launch of accelerated, super high-performance connectivity for research and higher education communications through BCNET's Kamloops transit exchange. The BCNET connection, up to 10,000 times faster than the commercial Internet, will expand teaching, scholarly activity and research opportunities without being limited by network capability, enabling partnerships and collaborations using state-of-the-art applications from networks across Canada and around the world. TRU's capacity to produce top-level research will be significantly enhanced by BCNET connectivity, said TRU President and Vice-Chancellor Roger Barnsley, as will the university's teaching and training capacity. "Connecting to BCNET will mean superb network connectivity for staff and students, allowing the university to engage students both in the classroom and distant locations, and to increase access to course, library and research materials as well as collaborative research projects, allowing the highest quality of student engagement possible," he said, adding that TRU recently joined a network of other institutions that will share their resources and experiment with using remote nodes to manipulate laboratory equipment in labs around the continent, allowing chemistry students in distant areas to gain "virtual" experience using specialized equipment that is not readily accessible in their community. On the research side, Barnsley noted, "Our population health researchers will now have much more effective access to the databases they use and our collaborators in drinking water quality research will now have 'real time' access to monitoring data that are linked to several ongoing experiments." "Kamloops has always been an important hub, and the Internet heralds a new trade route for commerce, redefining how we do business. Through the Kamloops Community Network, our city has built an on-ramp to the information highway, providing businesses and citizens with low-cost, high-speed communications via a publicly owned and operated utility," said Kamloops Mayor Terry Lake. Michael Hrybyk, BCNET President and CEO, spoke of the value of networks, communities and sharing data. "Staying connected to each other and to the world is very important," he said. "Research and teaching require bits of data-it can be tens of terabits, or 10 trillion bits. This data is only good if it is shared with someone; therefore, the value of networks is our ability to share data among faculty and staff and the local and global research and education communities." The Kamloops transit exchange, part of the BCNET 2010 Project launched in 2005 with capital funding of $3.15M from British Columbia?s Ministry of Advanced Education, uses high capacity, "super" broadband links to connect universities, institutes and communities across the province, and is linked to similar networks across Canada and throughout Europe and the Pacific Rim. -30- For more information, please contact:
Tamara Klein (Manager, BCNET Communications & Client Services)
Phone: 604-268-7865; Cell: 604-505-8455; Email: Brian Mackay (Associate Vice President, TRU IT Services)
Phone: 250-828-5326; Email: Jeff Putnam (CEO, Venture Kamloops)
Phone: 250-828-6818; Email: Background: A global system of education and research networks involves 42 nations around the world; all European and Pacific Rim countries have research networks. Canada connects to the worldwide research network through the Canadian national advanced network, CA net4, operated by CANARIE, with each of the 10 provinces responsible for building and managing an optical regional advanced network, which in BC is built and managed by BCNET.The BCNET 2010 Project, launched in 2005 with capital funding of $3.15M from the British Columbia Ministry of Advanced Education, aims to deliver a next-generation network using high capacity, "super" broadband links connecting universities and institutes across the province. Partnering closely with CANARIE, BCNET built 10-gigabit intercity links connecting new communities to the provincial Optical Regional Network (ORAN) which connects to the national CA net4 network and the global research network.Advanced networks, often called research networks, are super-high-performance networks, highly flexible and customizable for specialized projects, designed exclusively to connect the world's universities and other research and education institutions to support experimental and collaborative efforts in education and research. Up to 10,000 times faster than the commercial Internet, these specialized advanced networks provide the backbone for innovation in research, education and science in British Columbia. Using lightpaths, which are direct point-to-point channels or dedicated wave signals, researchers can transmit massive quantities of data at the speed of light, and enable interconnection between scientific equipment, instruments, sensors and databases. Through advanced research networks and data exchange centres, called transit exchanges BCNET brings unprecedented capacity for science, research, business development and innovation, which will enable campuses in BC communities to connect to a local exchange, greatly enhancing the network speed and bandwidth available, with the ability to connect to colleagues across the province, the country and around the world. BCNET has built new transit exchanges in Surrey, Kelowna and Kamloops through partnerships with universities, communities, government, research and private organizations, which saw the potential for super-broadband networks to bring a new communication information highway to foster economic development, research and growth for the information technology market. Today's launch celebrates this new connectivity in Kamloops. In Kamloops, BCNET worked closely with the City of Kamloops and the Kamloops City Network (KCN) to deliver fibre and a central Transit Exchange or data hub where the community can connect. In March 2006, BCNET lit up the Transit Exchange in Kamloops and today, Thompson Rivers University is connected to the BCNET Optical Regional Advanced Network (ORAN).
| 