Building and Sustaining NYU's High Speed Research Network
Tuesday, September 29 · 9:10–9:35 AM America/Denver · Main Room
Projects like the Holodeck surfaced a problem at NYU: research workflows needed bandwidth and latency the enterprise network was never designed to deliver. The solution developed was the High Speed Research Network (HSRN) - a university-funded network built to serve data-intensive and latency-sensitive research across the institution, addressing a range of needs beyond those that first exposed the gap. This session covers how that case was made and what followed: why HSRN was built parallel to the enterprise network rather than layered on top, why a fast network alone proved insufficient without services like Ceph storage and a Kubernetes edge cluster, and the challenges encountered during its construction and with researcher adoption. Also included is HSRN's Vertically Integrated Projects program, in which cross-disciplinary student teams take on real operational and development work—an approach that addresses the chronic research IT staffing problem by building capacity and a talent pipeline simultaneously. Open discussion follows for attendees facing similar questions on their own campuses.
Robert Pahle, PhD
NYU
Dr. Robert Pahle is a Senior Research Scientist in Research Technology at New York University, where he leads NYU's High Speed Research Network (HSRN) - a dedicated, low-latency infrastructure built to power data-intensive and latency-sensitive research across the university. HSRN infrastructure also includes Ceph-based storage and a Kubernetes edge cluster, allowing researchers to process and act on data in real time. Pahle also mentors students through the HSRN Vertically Integrated Projects (VIP) program, guiding cross-disciplinary teams on real-world software and infrastructure projects tied to the network's operation. Prior to NYU, he served as Technical Director for the Decision Theater at Arizona State University and held a faculty role at ASU's GeoDa Center, where he built decision-support systems, high-performance computing and visualization tools.