BIG DATA

NLR's TelePresence Exchange Connects up to 12 Different Locations in Single Session

National LambdaRail (NLR), the cutting-edge network for advanced research and innovation owned by the U.S. research and education community, hosted a multi-point TelePresence session between Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center (PSC), Pennsylvania State University's College of Information Sciences and Technology and the Renaissance Computing Institute (RENCI) of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, enabling network and IT administrators in the three locations to collaborate "face to face" using the highest-quality videoconferencing platform.

Up to 12 different physical locations can now be connected with each other at one time, simply by dialing in to one of the pre-set "meeting rooms" in NLR's TelePresence Exchange. The NLR TelePresence Exchange, located in Kansas City and based on technologies from Cisco, can support up to 3 TelePresence screens per participating location, or a total of 36 simultaneous screens.

"NLR's TelePresence Exchange and its pre-set "meeting rooms," makes it very straightforward for RENCI to take advantage of the latest in TelePresence technologies to communicate with colleagues around the country and, going forward, around the world," said Alan Blatecky, Interim Director, Renaissance Computing Institute. "While the TelePresence capability significantly reduces the need for travel and its expense, the more important value is that researchers have the ability to share ideas and explore new opportunities on a moment's notice. That's something that can't be done even through travel."

"The recent demonstration of multi-point TelePresence between PSC, Pennsylvania State University and RENCI reinforces that TelePresence is the leading-edge in live video tele-conferencing," said Wendy Huntoon, director of networking at the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center and NLR director of operations. "It's a clear step forward in both visual quality and ease of use. For PSC, this extends our ongoing productive collaboration with Cisco and close partnership with NLR."

The NLR Exchange also provides a single, integrated directory and dialing plan for NLR users, enabling easy scheduling and one-touch dialing, as well as performance monitoring to help ensure a top-quality video and audio experience for users. Only requirement for NLR members interested in TelePresence, other than a Cisco TelePresence unit, is a 1Gigabit, low-latency connection to NLR.

For more information on TelePresence over NLR, please visit: http://www.nlr.net/telepresence-faq.php.