[Federal Register Volume 64, Number 5 (Friday, January 8, 1999)]
[Notices]
[Pages 1184-1185]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 99-390]



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DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY

Office of Science


Office of Science Financial Assistance Program Notice 99-09; Next 
Generation Internet--Applications, Network Technology, and Network 
Testbed Partnerships

AGENCY: Department of Energy.

ACTION: Notice inviting research grant applications.

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SUMMARY: The Office of Advanced Scientific Computing Research (OASCR) 
of the Office of Science (SC), U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), hereby 
announces its interest in receiving applications for the Next 
Generation Internet--Applications, Network Technology, and Network 
Testbed Partnerships program. The Next Generation Internet (NGI) is a 
multi-agency federal research and development program to develop, test, 
and demonstrate advanced networking technologies and applications. This 
particular research notice invites research applications for 
Applications, Network Technology, and Network Testbed Partnerships to 
focus on integrating advanced applications with leading edge network 
research to test wide area data intensive collaborative computing 
technologies through partnerships between the developers of 
applications and network researchers.

DATES: Applicants are encouraged to submit a brief preapplication. All 
preapplications, referencing Program Notice 99-09, should be received 
by DOE by 4:30 P.M., E.S.T., February 12, 1999. A response to the 
preapplications discussing the potential program relevance and 
encouraging or discouraging a formal application generally will be 
communicated within several days of receipt.
    Formal applications submitted in response to this notice must be 
received by 4:30 P.M., E.S.T., March 31, 1999, in order to be accepted 
for merit review and to permit timely consideration for award in fiscal 
year 1999.

ADDRESSES: Preapplications, referencing Program Notice 99-09, should be 
sent by E-mail to [email protected].
    Formal applications, referencing Program Notice 99-09, should be 
sent to: U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Grants and 
Contracts Division, SC-64, 19901 Germantown Road, Germantown, MD 20874-
1290, ATTN: Program Notice 99-09. This address must also be used when 
submitting applications by U.S. Postal Service Express Mail, any other 
commercial overnight delivery service, or when hand-carried by the 
applicant. An original and seven copies of the application must be 
submitted.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mary Anne Scott, Office of Science, 
U.S. Department of Energy, 19901 Germantown Road, Germantown, MD 20874-
1290, telephone: (301) 903-6368, E-mail: [email protected], fax: (301) 
903-7774. The full text of Program Notice 99-09 is available via the 
Internet using the following web site address: http://www.er.doe.gov/
production/grants/grants.html

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The NGI initiative is a multi-agency Federal 
research and development (R&D) program that is developing advanced 
networking technologies, developing revolutionary applications that 
require advanced networking, and demonstrating these capabilities on 
testbeds that are 100 to 1,000 times faster end-to-end than today's 
Internet. Partnerships among academia, industry, and governments 
(Federal, state, local, and foreign) that will keep the U.S. at the 
cutting-edge of information and communications technologies are 
encouraged. (Details on submitting applications involving partnerships 
can be found in the Application Guide for the Office of Science 
Financial Assistance Program referenced below). The strategic R&D 
investments are coordinated across the agencies involved and are 
focused to produce an environment where advanced networking R&D 
breakthroughs are possible. Information concerning NGI can be found at 
http://www.ngi.gov/.

Topic Details

    DOE's current core programs in network and application research are 
intended to enhance the Department's ability to satisfy mission 
requirements through advanced technologies such as distributed 
computing, national collaboratories, remote access to facilities, and 
remote access to petabyte-scale datasets with complex internal 
structure. The DOE NGI Applications, Network Technology and Network 
Testbed Partnerships research will focus on integrating advanced 
applications with leading edge network research to test wide area data 
intensive and collaborative computing technologies. The objective of 
this research is to enable more efficient and smarter use of network 
resources, as well as to support higher speeds (that is, end-to-end 
capacity).
    The DOE encourages the submission of applications for Applications, 
Network Technology and Network Testbed Partnerships to address the 
issues and challenges required to create persistent wide area data 
intensive and collaborative computing testbed networks. These 
partnerships should combine the efforts of applications programmers, 
middleware developers, and network researchers to create persistent 
testbed networks that can support the diverse set of DOE mission 
critical applications described below.
    The important issues for applications programmers are:
     Support for advanced applications that address the needs 
of the DOE community including, but not limited to, distributed 
visualization of large data sets, remote access to Petabyte scale data 
archives of high energy physics experiments, and distributed 
collaborations to study functional genomics.
     Definition of what network services (e.g., bandwidth, 
latency, QoS) are required.
     Definition of what middleware services are required to 
permit these applications to effectively run over wide area networks.
    The important issues for the middleware developers are:
     Provide a rich set of features that applications can 
select and use to obtain the level of service they need to operate.
     Define the features and the API's necessary to allow the 
application and middleware to communicate.
     Define the specific network service calls that properly 
provision the underlying network for the applications needs.
     Tight integration of the middleware API's with the 
applications and also the physical services provided by the network 
layer.
    The important issues for the network researchers are:
     Integration of SAN, LAN, MAN, and WAN technologies to 
create distributed collaboratories.
     High performance network interfaces for super-computers to 
enable Gbps data rates between communicating applications.
     Management and control of network components (e.g., 
routers, switches, WDM's) to dynamically change network configurations 
in reasonable time frames (minutes to hours).
     Integration of Differentiated Services, or other Quality 
of Service functions, into wide area networks.
     Integration of these new technologies into the existing 
production networks as rapidly as possible without compromising the 
existing production network services.
    Running advanced applications over leading edge networks in a 
persistent manner requires research and

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development in many areas. It also requires the joint efforts of 
applications programmers, middleware developers, and network 
researchers to create persistent testbed networks that can support the 
diverse set of goals described above. This program notice seeks joint 
applications from these three communities to form partnerships to 
address the issues and challenges required to create these persistent 
wide area data intensive and collaborative computing testbed networks. 
Software tools developed are expected to interoperate with existing 
middleware tools as well as those under development.

Program Funding

    It is anticipated that up to $4 million will be available for 
multiple awards to be made in FY 1999 in the categories described 
above, contingent on the availability of appropriated funds. 
Applications may request project support up to three years, with out-
year support contingent on the availability of funds, progress of the 
research, and programmatic needs. Annual budgets are expected to range 
from $1,500,000 to $2,000,000 total costs.

Preapplications

    A brief preapplication may be submitted. The preapplication should 
identify on the cover sheet the institution, Principal Investigator 
name, address, telephone, fax and E-mail address, title of the project, 
and the field of scientific research. The preapplication should consist 
of a two to three page narrative describing the research project 
objectives and methods of accomplishment. These will be reviewed 
relative to the scope and research needs of the Next Generation 
Internet--University Network Technology Testbeds Program.
    Preapplications are strongly encouraged but not required prior to 
submission of a full application. Please note that notification of a 
successful preapplication is not an indication that an award will be 
made in response to the formal application.
    Applications will be subjected to scientific merit review (peer 
review) and will be evaluated against the following evaluation criteria 
listed in descending order of importance as codified at 10 CFR 
605.10(d):
    1. Scientific and/or Technical Merit of the Project,
    2. Appropriateness of the Proposed Method or Approach,
    3. Competency of Applicant's Personnel and Adequacy of Proposed 
Resources,
    4. Reasonableness and Appropriateness of the Proposed Budget.
    The evaluation will include program policy factors such as the 
relevance of the proposed research to the terms of the announcement and 
an agency's programmatic needs. Note, external peer reviewers are 
selected with regard to both their scientific expertise and the absence 
of conflict-of-interest issues. Non-federal reviewers may be used, and 
submission of an application constitutes agreement that this is 
acceptable to the investigator(s) and the submitting institution.
    Information about the development and submission of applications, 
eligibility, limitations, evaluation, selection process, and other 
policies and procedures may be found in 10 CFR Part 605, and in the 
Application Guide for the Office of Science Financial Assistance 
Program. Electronic access to the Guide and required forms is made 
available via the World Wide Web at: http://www.er.doe.gov/production/
grants/grants.html. The Project Description must be 20 pages or less, 
exclusive of attachments. The application must contain an abstract or 
project summary, letters of intent from collaborators, and short 
vitaes.

(The Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance Number for this program 
is 81.049, and the solicitation control number is ERFAP 10 CFR Part 
605.)

    Issued in Washington, DC on December 22, 1998.
John Rodney Clark,
Associate Director of Science for Resource Management.
[FR Doc. 99-390 Filed 1-7-99; 8:45 am]
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