A second Internet is coming, and Iowa State is part of the group that will help create it.

The project, known as Internet2, is in its beginning stages. The next generation of the net will function much like the original did — as a means of communication for the academic community.

The Internet, as it is known today, originally began as a Defense Department network to facilitate communication with universities that conducted research work.

The project was presided over by the National Science Foundation, and was known as a NSFnet. Universities would use the net as a means of communication and to check over jointly run experiments.

By April of 1995, however, the need for the grant program funding the net was no longer necessary, and private companies such as MCI and Sprint became responsible for the net.

Internet2, the current name for the project, was the result of meetings held a couple of years ago by members of the academic community.

The meetings focused on the architecture of the present net, and officials were concerned about the way the present net is constructed and the problems the architecture can create for users, especially members of the academic research communities.

The Internet2 Project mission reads, “[To] facilitate and coordinate the development, deployment, operation and technology transfer of advanced, network-based applications and network services to further U.S. leadership in research and higher education and accelerate the availability of new services and applications on the Internet.”

George Covert, associate director of the ISU Computation Center, said, “Internet2 will provide the higher education and research community with new vistas, and the same sense of excitement, provided by the the original Internet. It is the next dimension in cyberspace.”

The list of educational institutions involved in the Internet2 Project is long. Besides Iowa State, there are more than 100 other schools involved in the project, including Harvard University, Duke University and Yale University.

Covert and the members of Internet2 recognize the potential for the second net and realize it will eventually interact with the first Internet.

One of the major concerns the project’s committee hopes to address is latency, which is technical jargon for the the minimum time delay needed when transferring information.

Other ideas Internet2 will be addressing are tele-immersion, virtual libraries and virtual laboratories. Tele-immersion would enable individuals who are speaking to exist within identical environments. In other words, they would be immersed in the same room.

Net users seeking further information on Internet2 can look up the project’s web site at http://www.Internet2.edu.