Mississippi State University and C Spire hosted a test proving the viability of a system used by universities across Mississippi.
The firm tested the first terabit speed connections on a university campus in Mississippi as part of improvements to the Mississippi Optical Network (MissiON). MissiON services MSU, the University of Mississippi, the University of Mississippi Medical Center, the University of Southern Mississippi, Jackson State University, the Stennis Space Center, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Engineering Research and Development Center and the Interne 2 Consortium. Mississippi’s four regional universities, Mississippi Valley State University, Alcorn State University, Delta State University and the Mississippi University for Women are also being added to the consortium. The company announced the test, which took place in November, last week. The test was conducted on campus with engineers from C Spire, Nokia and the Canadian EXFO firm, along with the MSU Information Technology Department.
C Spire Network Service Delivery Vice President Eric Hollingsworth described the test as a proof of concept to see if terabit speeds were attainable on the network.
“We built a network for the universities called the MissiON network, and it connects all of those universities together, and it provides them access to an entity called Internet 2, which is basically a version of the internet that’s used really just for research,” he said. “We turned that network up for them, and in doing that we increased their speed. I think it was a three to four times overall bandwidth increase.”
Hollingsworth said there was much potential for growth with the terabit speeds offered by the upgrade.
“Mississippi State volunteered first, and so we got all the experts we needed with the test gear, with our own internal engineering resources and their IT guys, and we went into their data center and built up a small network basically.”
He said MSU didn't need the amount of bandwidth yet, but had plenty of room to grow into it as the university’s networks grew.
“The universities are preparing their students for the future, and we try to prepare ourselves for the future, because data demand goes up so rapidly every year, and it’s hard to stay ahead of it,” Hollingsworth said.
At terabit speeds, a network can download 125 gigabits every second, an amount equivalent to a season of Game of Thrones, 25 full-length films in high definition, 2,083 hours of streaming music, 62,500 photos and 695,000 web pages.
“We’re excited to be a part of this proof-of-concept trial, and we look forward to continuing our work with C Spire to make this vital infrastructure second to none,” said MSU Vice President for Research and Economic Development and MissiON Network Advisory Council Chairman David Shaw.”