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TOP STORIES FOR MONDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2003 National LambdaRail Goes Live USC Offers Videoconferencing Mining Data for Medical Research Utah Plans Public Fiber-Optic Network Project NATIONAL LAMBDARAIL GOES LIVE This week the first section of the National LambdaRail (NLR) will go live, connecting the TeraGrid facility in Chicago with the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center. The NLR project will eventually use 10,000 miles of currently unused fiber-optic cable to create an extremely fast network for research and other scientific pursuits. Officials involved said a dedicated, high-speed network is essential to the ongoing development of data-intensive research projects, such as the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, a three-dimensional model of the universe, or the human genome project. Currently, programs such as these generate vast amounts of data that cannot be transmitted efficiently using current networks. When complete, the NLR is expected to encompass 40 channels, each with a capacity of 10 Gbps, or 10 billion bits per second. Researchers will also be able to use the LambdaRail for applications such as high-definition videoconferencing. Wired News, 17 November 2003 http://www.wired.com/news/infostructure/0,1377,61102,00.html USC OFFERS VIDEOCONFERENCING The University of Southern California (USC) has begun offering free videoconferencing services to students as part of a communications package that also includes local and long-distance calls and collaboration tools. The university has discontinued long-distance phone service, citing the prevalence of cell phones on campus, and the three applications in the communications package use Internet technology rather than phone lines. Officials from USC said the software they chose to implement the videoconferencing is less expensive and simpler to install and use than other desktop videoconferencing products. USC's system works with both Windows-based and Macintosh computers, and students and researchers expect the system to become an important educational tool. Around 1,000 students living on campus have signed up for the service so far. Chronicle of Higher Education, 21 November 2003 (sub. req'd) http://chronicle.com/prm/weekly/v50/i13/13a02902.htm MINING DATA FOR MEDICAL RESEARCH IBM has announced a three-year deal with the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) to provide tools to help researchers identify hidden connections between demographic groups and certain medical conditions. IBM will use various data-mining tools to analyze data from distinct medical specialties to try to find genetic or other links among patients. A similar program is under way at Stanford University. The UCSF research will initially address Alzheimer's disease, looking to see, for example, if men within a specified age range who suffer from other medical problems have a higher incidence of Alzheimer's disease. According to IBM, researchers involved in the UCSF program hope to develop an easy-to-use Web-based system that provides access to necessary data while protecting privacy for patients and adequate security for their personal information. CNET, 17 November 2003 http://news.com.com/2100-7337-5107401.html UTAH PLANS PUBLIC FIBER-OPTIC NETWORK PROJECT Eighteen cities in Utah are working on plans to build a $470-million fiber-optic network available to hundreds of thousands of business and residential residents of the cities involved. The project is unique because its goal is to bring fiber-optic connections to individual homes. Only about 65,000 households have fiber-optic connections today; the Utah project, called Utah Telecommunication Open Infrastructure Agency (Utopia), would bring such connections to nearly 250,000 households in the state and 34,500 businesses. Telecommunications companies and some consumer groups have complained that an extremely high-speed network such as Utopia is unnecessary for the needs of Utah citizens. Companies including Qwest, the local regional phone company, also complain about the possibility of finding themselves in competition for customers with a publicly sponsored network. New York Times, 17 November 2003 (registration req'd) http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/17/technology/17utopia.html ***************************************************** EDUPAGE INFORMATION To subscribe, unsubscribe, or change your settings, visit http://www.educause.edu/pub/edupage/edupage.html Or, you can subscribe or unsubscribe by sending e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To SUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SUBSCRIBE Edupage YourFirstName YourLastName To UNSUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SIGNOFF Edupage If you have subscription problems, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For past issues of Edupage or information about translations of Edupage into other languages, visit http://www.educause.edu/pub/edupage/edupage.html ***************************************************** OTHER EDUCAUSE PUBLICATIONS EDUCAUSE publishes periodicals, including "EQ" and "EDUCAUSE Review," books, and other materials dealing with the impacts and implications of information technology in higher education. 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