Some researchers in California and elsewhere may soon have access to a network some 10 times to 100 times faster than the Internet, the New York Times reports.
A five-year, $5 million dollar grant from the US National Science Foundation will enable the Pacific Research Platform to connect university laboratories and supercomputer centers together with lightning-fast speeds, allowing researchers in data-heavy fields like physics, astronomy, and genetics to easily share large datasets.
The Times notes that the wider Internet is geared toward transferring small amounts of data, and that though Internet connections might be rated as 10 gigabits per second, they are often in reality slower.
This network, which won't be connected to the wider Internet, will first connect researchers at 10 University of California campuses and 10 other universities or research institutes. Not being connected to the Internet will also afford a level of security, the Times says, noting that a University of California, San Diego server connected to the Internet had to withstand 35,000 false login attempts in a day.
It adds that the project is to be a model for future computer networks.