EVALSOa high bandwidth

communication link for Paranal

ESO Lunch Talk - 2010/11/30

G.Filippi gfilippi@eso.org

Why?

For very obvious reasons, Observatories tend to be built in remote areas where high capacity communication infrastructures are not normally available or easily accessible. This is the case for the ESO Paranal and the Cerro Armazones Observatories, located in the Atacama Desert, in the Northern region of Chile.

Although computing and networking infrastructures are available and continuously evolving at the sites, the possibility to fully exploit in real time such facilities is limited by the available bandwidth to connect them to the rest of the research and academic world. To fully exploit such remote sites (from fast data transfer to rapid response mode, from remote monitoring and engineering to virtual presence) high capacity links, i.e., bandwidth >Gigabit-per-second (Gbps), are necessary.

The start

Driven by this idea, a consortium of 9 members has been created in 2007 aiming to create a physical infrastructure (and the tools to exploit it) to efficiently connect the the ESO Paranal and the Bochum Cerro Armazones (OCA) Observatories to Latin American network and from there to Europe.

The project builds on the National Research network of Chile (REUNA) and International infrastructures created in the last years with the EC support (RedCLARA, GEANT) to provide Latin American and European Research a competitive edge by having faster access to the collected data and using the connected facilities in an ever more efficient way.

This proposal was presented at the European Commission Frame Program 7 and in late 2007 was granted co-funding.

Enabling Virtual Access to Latin–America Southern Observatories

… was born!

EVALSO

• SA1: Upgrading of the communication infrastructure

• JRA1: Fast Data Access• Will aim at drastically improve the time needed for making the data available from

the moment of the physical observation.

• JRA2: Virtual Presence • Will plan and produce the tools that

could be used to make possible the virtual presence of scientists, engineers, and experts at remote facilities and, to the extreme, the possibility to perform remote observations.

• JRA3: New observing modes • Will investigate and concept prove new

observing modes made now possible by the availability of the fast link and the tools developed by JRA2.

Astronomer’s & Engineer’s Presence

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Serviceobservation

Target ofOpportunity

Visitormode

MaintenanceAssisted ToO

Project Structure(Workpackages)

Where

• The ESO Paranal (PAO) and Cerro Armazones Observatories (OCA), located in the Atacama Desert in the North of Chile.

• The REUNA offices in Antofagasta (approximately 120 km from the Observatory)

• The ESO and REUNA Offices in Santiago de Chile (about 1200 km south of Antofagasta)

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

The Atacama desert and the Observatories

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2

3

4

5

67Atacama

Santiago

Antofagasta

Dark Fiber: unlimited capacity“Lambda”: (currently) 10Gpbs

EVALSO Communication InfrastructureOverall layout and plan

2008: marker survey2009: selection, procurement, engineering2010: construction, installation, testing. Completion October 2010

Segment 1 (ESO Paranal to “La Varilla” cross road (B-710/Ruta5):

Segment 1a: new 12-core fiber cable for direct installation underground

Type of fiber: ITU G652.DLength: 75 KmsAttenuation: 18,5dB @ 1550nmChromatic Dispersion: ps/nm 1258

Segment 1b: one fiber pair from existing aerial cable (TELEFONICA)

Type of fiber: ITU G652.DLength: 50 KmsAttenuation: 11,5dB @ 1550nmChromatic Dispersion:

Total Length: 125KmsTotal Attenuation: 30dB @ 1550nm

Segment 4: (Cerro Armazones Observatory to ESO Paranal)

Type of fiber: ITU G652.DLength: 30Km (20 new cable, same as for 1a +10 from Segment 1a)Attenuation: 9dB @ 1550nm

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101112

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101112

Varillas/Ruta 5

OCA

Fiber

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

FIBER PLAN

PAO

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Fiber cable specification and layout

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

New fiber cable along ROAD B-710

KM 117.200 Ruta B-710 Gaspipe crossing

La Varilla Ruta 5 Norte crossing

Topography and detailed plans needed for Official approval by MOP (Chilean Public Works Ministry)

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Some details of the new fiber Construction

Item 1a: Logistic (at Paranal Observatory) for:• machinery and vehicles• road safety signals, warning tape• cable (~100km) and materials

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Some details of the new fiber Construction

Item 1a: trenching, tunneling (road crossings)

SPIE Astronomical Instrumentation, San Diego, 2010 - 12 - Ref 7740-35, June 30, G.Filippi (ESO)

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Some details of the new fiber Construction

Item 1a: excavation for manholes, warning tape, fiber cable lay-down

SPIE Astronomical Instrumentation, San Diego, 2010 - 13 - Ref 7740-35, June 30, G.Filippi (ESO)

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Some details of the new fiber Construction

Item 1a: construction started from Paranal Observatory, along ESO private access road, reached the B-710 and it is advancing parallel to it.

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Connecting to the existing fiber

Item 1a: crossing under Ruta5 at La Varilla

Item1b: drop off the existing fiber cable.

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Rocks, rocks and …. more rocks

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Construction of the new fibers

EVALSO Communication InfrastructureEVALSO Communication Infrastructure

… some views

Antofagasta

2

TELCO Santiago

Copiapo Provision for Add&Drop access points for REUNA traffic.

La Serena

One wavelength at 10Gbps (for the time being)

EVALSO Communication InfrastructureEVALSO Communication Infrastructure

The “LAMBDA” backbone

EVALSO Communication InfrastructureSantiago: connections to ESO and REUNA

and planned ring with CLARA

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Equipment Specification and Layout

CIENA CN 4200 family– 5 slot chassis– Power Unit and Fan redundant– Service Card

– M3 : 3x1GEth– F10A: 1xOTU-2, 2x1GEth

Power ModulesFan

4 Service Card slots

Filters (MUX/DEMUX) slot

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Selected Equipment

EVALSO Communication Infrastructure

Equipment in the service points

PARANAL

REUNA/Santiago

ESO/Vitacura

(RedCLARA)

TELCO Antofagasta

TELCO Santiago

2010/11/04Launching event in Santiago

2010/11/04

.. some moments of the launching event

GEANT2/DANTE

100km Optical Fiber

Trans-Atlantic link

OCA

ESO Paranal

DFN (D-NREN)

EVALSO … … is there!!!!!

NL-NRENGB-NREN

Some Remarks

• EVALSO cannot be considered the ultimate solution• Continental infrastructures have to be coordinated to remove the

bottlenecks, especially between Latin America and Europe• The limiting element in the chain is now the intercontinental link capacity

and its cost

But in the meantime let us be happy for making the first step …• … and let me thank and congratulate the people in the different

organizations who have worked really hard to make this first achievement of EVALSO a reality

• … within budget!

(Fernando Liello, Project Coordinator, Universita’ di Trieste, from his presentation at EVALSO Launching event)

Current and future use

Till the end of the EVALSO project (mid2011), it will be available for the Research Activities of the EVALSO Consortium. After that time, the infrastructure will be used according to mutual agreements that are being discussed among ESO, OCA, and REUNA.

Some key concepts:• ESO will be responsible for the maintenance of the optical infrastructure;• REUNA will be responsible for the maintenance of the DWDM equipment

and for the network operation for all nodes;• Dedicated channels are established between: OCA and

REUNA/Antofagasta, ESO/Paranal and ESO/Santiago, REUNA/Antofagasta and REUNA/Santiago, ESO/Santiago and REUNA/Santiago;

• More channels may become active as result of future projects and agreements.

Example: OCA

Thanks to the availability of high bandwidth communication to the observatory infrastructure, the AIRUB(OCA) plans to:

• reduce travel waste (people time, money, CO2) thanks to remote real-time control of telescopes and robotic operation

• reduce data transfer costs by replacing shipping over hard disks• allows immediate response to newly discovered variable phenomena• use remotely controlled telescopes with good video and audio quality links

as part of the educational process (teaching and/or training) without need for expensive traveling and therefore more affordable for the students/university

(Rolf Chini, RUB-OCA from his presentation at EVALSO Launching event)

www.evalso.eu

CREDITSMy thanks go to the many people that contributed to the project, among

those:DMO: F.Comeron, D.Dobrzycka, …SDD/IT: B.Kublik, F.Heissenhuber, M.Naumann, …SDD/Data: S.Zampieri, …PAO: A.Wright, F.Luco, F.Ruseler, …ePOD: G.Argandona, O.Usher, …ADD: E.Patkos, …ADD/C&P: Y.Wesse, …

... and many more!

A special thank to ADD, C&P, PAO Logistics and all ESO functions that provided invaluable support during the various project phases.

Many thanks for your attention, and for any questions feel free to contact me.

Giorgio Filippi

European Southern Observatory

Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2, 

D-85748 Garching bei Muenchen,  Germany.

Email: gfilippi@eso.org