C2 Project Improves Access to Cyberinfrastructure Resources for Ecosystems Scientists

The C2 project provided the groundwork for a recently awarded a grant of nearly half a million dollars through the National Science Foundation to support a project which will improve the University of Montana?s cyberinfrastructure. The two-year Campus Cyberinfrastructure-Network Infrastructure and Engineering Program (CC-NIE) project is under the guidance of Drs. Loey Knapp, Jeffrey Good, Anna Klene, John McCutcheon, and Rebecca Bendick. UM's ARNI project will assist in procuring a 1Gb dedicated connection at the desktop level as well as a dual 10Gb shared connection at the building level for several key sites housing active research requiring heavy bandwidth. This effort will greatly enhance the ability of researchers to actively participate in their fields, work in collaboration with other researchers at the national and international level, and broaden the impact of their research efforts.?? Specific areas of research to be affected by the ARNI project include studies of animal-microbial symbioses, mountain pine beetle-induced changes in forest infrastructure and hydrology (and subsequent impact on fire management), and geodynamics research in relation to earthquakes in the developing world.