Colocation
3ROX has three point-of-presence (PoPs) associated with its metro network infrastructure: the Mellon Institute, Allegheny Center and Westinghouse. Colocation space and connection to either the regional or wide area network may be available for research projects. Projects are evaluated on a case-by-case basis and depending upon the project requirements, there may be some costs associated with colocation equipment in one of the PoPs.
Network Infrastructure
As part of the NSF funded ARI grant, 3ROX has established the 3ROX Research Resource Pool, research resources that are available at no cost to any researcher, research project, or lab associated with a 3ROX participant.
More information on the 3ROX Research Resource Pool
For any questions regarding how to apply for these resources contact info@3rox.net.
Internet2 Research Wave Program
Internet2 has established a Research Wave Program to stimulate innovative, transformative research by providing dedicated access to Internet2 Network services at a reduced cost for specific time periods. Similar to the 3ROX Resource Pool, backbone infrastructure, either point-to-point Ethernet Backbone Waves or dark backbone channels, are available to qualified researchers. These resources can be combined with components from the 3ROX Research Resource Pool to help enable cost effective national network infrastructure for research projects.
Additional information on the Internet2 Research Wave Program
Proposal help
3ROX engineers are available to provide help on gathering the technical information needed when submitting a proposal and can be contacted by sending email to info@3rox.net.
Recommended text: We recommend the following text for the Facilities Section of NSF or other proposals:
3 Rivers Optical Exchange
The Three Rivers Optical Exchange (3ROX) is a regional network aggregation point, also called a GigaPoP, providing high-speed commodity and research network access to sites in Western and Central Pennsylvania and West Virginia. 3ROX is based at Carnegie Mellon University and is operated and managed by the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center (PSC). While the primary focus of 3ROX is to provide cost-effective, high-capacity, state-of-the-art network connectivity to the university community, this infrastructure also provides well-defined network services to both community (K-12, government) and commercial entities in Western Pennsylvania. Member sites currently include Carnegie Mellon University, the Pennsylvania State University, the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center, the University of Pittsburgh, WVNet and West Virginia University.
3ROX Metropolitan Area Network Infrastructure
3ROX MAN infrastructure is DWDM-based and supports multiple 10-Gigabit Ethernet waves. It is capable of supporting 40 and 100-Gigabit waves as the need arises. This DWDM network connects four different locations around the city that include long haul service providers, a co-location hotel, a campus based co-location facility, and the Northern Pike machine room.
3ROX Wide Area Network Infrastructure
3ROX WAN infrastructure has both Commodity Internet and Research and Education components. Explicit routing is used to maintain the acceptable use policies associated with the various production and research network infrastructures.
The 3ROX Commodity Internet component consists of multiple high-performance WAN connections to major Internet service providers, including a 10 Gigabit Ethernet connection to Cogent and a 10 Gigabit Ethernet connection to Level3. In addition, the Internet2 Content Peering Service, private peering, and content caches are used to offload Commodity Internet traffic.
The 3ROX Research and Education component includes a 100 Gigabit Ethernet connection to the Internet2 network. In addition to the Internet2 connection, 3ROX also has a 10-Gigabit Ethernet connection to the XSEDE backbone network via Internet2; a 10-Gigabit Ethernet connection between PSC’s offices and its remote supercomputing machine room at 4350 Northern Pike; and a 10-Gigabit Ethernet connection to Penn State University (PSU) to provide XSEDE connectivity to PSU.