Research and Development of High-End Computer Networks at GSFC

Users of computer networks do not always get the throughput performance that they should get or need to get. Various factors affect the throughput performance, including bandwidth limitations in some links in the end-to-end network path between the user’s client workstation and the server and limitations in the throughput performance of the hardware/ software network interface of the client workstation or server. Recent objectives of GSFC’s high-end computer networking research and development are to research, evaluate, demonstrate, and provide new, minimum-cost network technologies that: 1) increase bandwidth to a non-blocking capability in the network links at GSFC and in GSFC’s links with various research-oriented wide area networks, and 2) provide pro-active measures of throughput performance to identify the cause of individual users’ throughput performance limitations and provide network performance assistance to optimize the network interfaces and paths used by those network users.