The enhanced network, which supports activities that range from managing NASA’s space launch program to hosting millions of visitors from around the world, will leverage Optical Transport Network (OTN) technology from Ciena to consolidate the Center’s Ethernet, video and legacy ATM and TDM traffic, said a press release.

NASA’s KSC is comprised of more than 200 facilities spread across a 144,000 acre complex. With an aging and fragmented campus network bearing the weight of growing bandwidth demands, the Center is turning to Ciena and Abacus to create a converged telecommunications infrastructure.

Abacus is leading the design and installation of the new campus network, with completion of the campus upgrade expected in March.

The new intelligent network is connecting major campus facilities via a fiber optic infrastructure using Ciena’s 4200 Advanced Services Platform. The OTN-enabled network will support the transport of Ethernet, SONET and video traffic and will facilitate the consolidation of the campus’s aging technology backbones – such as ATM and SONET – onto a common infrastructure.

KSC is also leveraging Ciena’s network management solution for efficient service deployment and proactive network management of its next-generation architecture.

“The use of OTN technology provides an elegant solution for complex networks like the one at Kennedy Space Center that support many types of legacy, Ethernet and real-time applications,” said David Peed, vice president and general manager, Ciena Government Solutions, Inc.

“Ciena’s solution can more efficiently carry this multi-service traffic over a single infrastructure, and easily add new types of applications to the network as NASA’s Kennedy Space Center continues

to push the boundaries of exploration,” he concluded.