Taking advantage of new options for network connectivity to the Internet2 national research and education Network, the Great Plains Network (GPN) today announced it will double its network connectivity on behalf of its member universities by adding a second 10 Gigabit connection to the Internet2 Network.

This connectivity will provide the additional capacity needed to ensure that scientists and educators from GPN member universities in South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa can effectively collaborate with colleagues around the world on exciting "big science" projects.

The additional connectivity will also provides GPN a pathway for participating in the Internet2 Commercial Peering Service (CPS) which provides peering to commodity Internet traffic. In doing so, GPN can leverage their Internet2 investment to more cost effectively provide higher performance commodity Internet services to its members.

“The GPN community continues to push the envelope as innovators in major scientific research projects like the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory (DUSEL), advanced climate modeling and interactive educational experiences – among many others,” said Bill Mitchell, GPN Executive Director. “Through our newly enhanced connectivity to the Internet2 Network – we can assure our scientists the bandwidth they need to conduct transformative research”.

“Internet2 has been working with our Network Members and Connector community for some time to develop a new connectivity fee model that would provide a better pathway for enabling enhanced hybrid network capabilities at a substantially lower cost per-bit,” said Rob Vietzke, Internet2 Executive Director of Network Services, “We are pleased to partner with GPN to enable this additional connection under our new offering. We look forward to working with their members to take advantage of this added capacity which holds the promise of supporting a new generation of scientific, educational and medical applications across the GPN region.”

In February 2010, Internet2 introduced new network connection fee options allowing its network connectors to cost effectively choose a 2x5G or 2x10G connection to the Internet2 Network. In doing so, members can more easily take advantage of any combination of network services including IP, Internet2’s dynamic network service called ION or Internet2 CPS.

GPN was the first to sign an agreement with Internet2 to benefit from the new 2010 network fee options, designed to significantly enhance the research and education national infrastructure.  GPN was also the very first regional connector to connect to the original Internet2 network – called Abilene- in 1998.