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Building communities for committed network evolution activities – joint SIG-NGN & SIG-TFN meeting in Norway

The 15th meeting for the Special Interest Group on Next Generation Networks (SIG-NGN) together with the Special Interest Group on Time & Frequency Networks (SIG-TFN) took place on 9 September 2024, co-located with the NORDUnet Conference 2024 (NDN2024) in Bergen, Norway.

A total of 30 in-person participants came together to discuss 4 main topics: Optical fibre sensing technology, Low Earth Orbit (LEO) Satellite communication, service orchestration tools, and time & frequency distribution in Europe.

In addition to the sharing of experiences and insights, the meeting aimed to raise awareness of the activities in these four areas, and to enable participation and eventually commitment by more NRENs.

SIG-NGN’s agenda started off with a fibre sensing update from Eoin Kenny (HEAnet), including their journey, current, and more long-term plans. Speakers also presented on distributed sensing technology (Kurosh Bozorgebrahimi – SIKT) and exploring the use of LEOsat to expand the ESnet Wireless Edge (Andrew Wiedlea – ESnet). Discussion continued following a few presentations on Workflow Orchestrator from Simone Spinelli (GEANT), Mick O’Donovan (HEAnet) and Scott Richmond (ESnet).

 

It was concluded that to be successful in the evolution of the next generation of research and education networking, such efforts need commitment such as time, money and people. To create such an impact on the wider community, a community of practice and a community of RENs with a joint commitment to the effort is needed.

Part of the agenda was shared with the newly formed SIG-TFN, reflecting the importance of time and frequency distribution in the future of research and education networks. The discussions focused not only on technology, but also on fostering a community of practice that would ensure sustained progress in these emerging fields.

Guy Roberts from GÉANT started with an introduction and overview of the newly formed SIG-TFN. In addition to this, there was considerable interest in a presentation by Sven-Christian from RISE on his collaboration with Nokia Bell Labs to develop a coherent optical transponder for use in time distribution. An insightful discussion followed the presentations, indicating that there is interest among NRENs in deploying these transponders in their networks. Jani Myyry (CSC) and Kurosh Bozorgebrahimi (SIKT) also explained the White Rabbit links that they have built between Norway, Sweden, and Finland, and the improved performance of these links.

The consensus in the wrap-up discussion concluded time distribution and cable sensing share strong technological overlaps and deployment synergies can be achieved. It was agreed that further work on in this area will be beneficial for the NREN community.

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