Australian Research and Education network funding
As part of the EIF/SuperScience funding announced last year, $37M was set aside for network infrastructure investment/enhancement over three years. The fund is allocated against the AREN (Australian Research and Education Network), which is currently managed through AARNet infrastructure. DIISR has now appointed a facilitator for these funds, Mr Steve Black, to report on infrastructure demand and supply and make recommendations for the expenditure of the funds.
The $37M is earmarked, not for on-campus infrastructure development, but for strategic opportunities such as: major centres that support research and education; significant gaps in backbone coverage and; connecting aggregation points for regional clusters of sites. The major data storage infrastructure planned through EIF is a separate but related need, as storage depends on good connectivity.
Intersect staff recently met with Mr. Black who has asked Intersect to help the process of consulting with the NSW research community. Stay tuned for more details, or contact markus.buchhorn@intersect.org.au
Recent appointments
Intersect has recently positioned two staff members as eResearch Analysts at regional member campuses. Elaine Gully is acting as the eResearch Analyst at the University of Wollongong. Stuart Allen is filling the role of eResearch Analyst at the University of Newcastle. Their contacts can be found here.
Kind regards
Leonie Hellmers
