CERNET

CERNET
Name	CERNET
Native name	中国教育和科研计算机网
Formed	1994
Headquarters	Beijing, People's Republic of China
Region served	China

CERNET is the acronym for the China Education and Research Network, a national academic network established to interconnect universities, research institutes, and educational institutions across the People's Republic of China. Founded in the mid-1990s to provide high-speed backbone connectivity and specialized services for scientific computing, CERNET became a critical infrastructure linking Chinese academic users with international networks and enabling large-scale collaborations in computing, physics, life sciences, and engineering. It has evolved through multiple generations of backbone upgrades, protocol migrations, and policy adaptations to support contemporary demands for cloud services, big data, and high-performance computing.

History

CERNET was initiated amid global developments such as the growth of Internet, the expansion of National Science Foundation initiatives, and regional networking projects like the Abilene Network and JANET that shaped early backbone design. Its origin traces to planning in the early 1990s, concurrent with projects led by prominent institutions including Tsinghua University, Peking University, and the Chinese Academy of Sciences which advocated for a dedicated academic backbone. Major milestones include backbone deployments in the 1990s, migration to IPv6 addressing in programs paralleling the Internet Protocol evolution, and integration with international research networks through peering with organizations like Geant, APAN, and GLORIAD. Over time, CERNET’s upgrades mirrored global transitions such as the adoption of dense wavelength-division multiplexing used in networks operated by China Telecom and partnerships influenced by initiatives from Ministry of Education (People's Republic of China) stakeholders.

Architecture and network infrastructure

CERNET’s multi-tier architecture comprises regional nodes hosted at leading universities and centralized exchange points similar to architectures seen at Internet2 and GEANT. Core backbone links employ high-capacity fiber routes using technologies first standardized by bodies such as the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and the International Telecommunication Union. Edge connectivity connects campus networks at institutions like Fudan University, Zhejiang University, and Shanghai Jiao Tong University to metropolitan aggregation points modeled after campus backbone designs from MIT and Stanford University. Routing uses protocols standardized by IETF working groups, while transport leverages hardware vendors that supply routers and optical gear to networks such as Level 3 Communications and Nokia. CERNET also operates parallel experimental networks for testbeds in areas influenced by projects like GENI and PlanetLab.

Services and applications

CERNET offers a portfolio of services including IP transit, multicast distribution for distance learning, time synchronization aligned with China National Time Service Center, and domain name services analogous to patterns in RENATER and SURFnet. Application-layer offerings have supported digital libraries, scholarly repositories inspired by initiatives at Library of Congress and Stanford Digital Repository, and cloud platforms similar to deployments by Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure tailored for academic workloads. High-performance data transfer services enable collaborations in fields represented at CERN, ITER, and national laboratories, facilitating data-intensive workflows in astronomy, genomics at centers comparable to BGI, and climate modeling at institutes like National Center for Atmospheric Research.

Governance and funding

Governance of CERNET involves coordination among ministerial stakeholders including agencies analogous to the Ministry of Education (People's Republic of China) and national research bodies such as the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Operational oversight is shared with host institutions including Tsinghua University and Hefei Institutes of Physical Science that provide management and administrative frameworks resonant with governance models used by Internet2 and TERENA. Funding has combined central allocations, provincial support, and contributions from participating universities, reflecting patterns observed in the funding of infrastructures like National Science Foundation programs and regional research networks. Procurement and policy decisions interface with state-owned carriers similar to China Mobile and China Telecom for lease of fiber and transit services.

Research, education, and collaborations

CERNET has been central to national initiatives in e-learning, telemedicine, and distributed scientific collaboration, enabling partnerships with international consortia such as APAN, GLORIAD, and GEANT. It underpins projects in computational science carried out at institutions like Peking University, Tsinghua University, and Zhejiang University and supports student mobility and distance education programs parallel to those organized by Coursera and edX partners at Chinese universities. Collaborative research extends to infrastructure topics studied in forums like the IETF and IEEE Communications Society, and to domain science collaborations with facilities such as CERN for particle physics data exchange and with observatories linked to Square Kilometre Array preparatory consortia.

Security and privacy practices

Security operations at CERNET follow practices comparable to CERT coordination exemplified by US-CERT and collaborative protocols discussed within the FIRST community. Measures include network monitoring, incident response, and routing security mechanisms inspired by deployments of RPKI and BGP best current practices promoted by the IETF. Privacy approaches balance institutional requirements from universities with compliance regimes analogous to national policies managed by bodies like the Ministry of Public Security (People's Republic of China). Research on anonymization, access control, and secure middleware has drawn on academic work from groups within Tsinghua University and Peking University, and participates in standardization dialogues with organizations such as the ITU.

Category:Telecommunications in China Category:Academic computer networks