Computing Research Policy Blog

GENI Science Council Named

The Computing Community Consortium (CCC), in consultation with the National Science Foundation, has selected the initial membership of the Science Council for the Global Environment for Networking Innovations (GENI). This GENI Science Council (GSC) will represent the computing research community in guiding the Science Plan for GENI -- an experimental facility planned by NSF in collaboration with the research community, "to enable the research community to invent and demonstrate a global communications network and related services that will be qualitatively better than today's Internet."

The initial members are:

• Tom Anderson, University of Washington (distributed systems and networking);⁺⁺
• Hari Balakrishnan, MIT (wireless networking);
• Joe Berthold, CIENA (optical networking);
• Charlie Catlett, Argonne National Laboratory (grid computing)⁺;
• Mike Dahlin, University of Texas (distributed systems);
• Stephanie Forrest, University of New Mexico (biological system modeling, security);
• Roscoe Giles, Boston University (educational technology);
• Ed Lazowska, University of Washington (systems);^{* +}
• Peter Lee, Carnegie Mellon University (software);⁺
• Helen Nissenbaum, NYU (social, ethical and political dimensions of IT);
• Jennifer Rexford, Princeton (networking);⁺⁺
• Stefan Savage, UCSD (networking and security);
• Scott Shenker, chair, UC Berkeley (networking);⁺⁺
• Alfred Spector, IBM (ret.) (software);
• Ellen Zegura, vice chair, Georgia Tech (networking, including wireless)^{*, +}

The members of the GSC were selected from a pool of more than 100 specific individuals nominated by the computing community representing roughly 20 research areas.

In selecting the GSC, CCC and NSF considered a number of criteria, including trying to insure that most GENI-relevant research communities were represented on the GSC, that the members should have strong individual reputations in the GENI-relevant research communities and recognized as "deep thinkers," and that the selection process seek diversity of all sorts: geographical, institution type, gender, ethnic, etc. In addition, the CCC intends to add representation from the networking industry that builds components and provides network engineering expertise for the alternative technologies, but will wait to add those individuals until the results of the GENI Project Office (GPO) solicitation are known. (It was felt that individuals who are likely to have key roles in the GPO shouldn't serve on the GSC, so that the GSC can offer independent advice if requested.)

Scott Shenker will serve as Chair of the GSC, and Ellen Zegura will serve as Vice Chair. A few details remain, including establishing the terms of service (and determining the staggering of the terms of the initial appointees) -- but those are expected to be worked out shortly.

Additional detail (pdf) on the selection of the GENI Science Council.

More on GENI. And a helpful FAQ.

More on CCC.