DIGITAL TWIN CAPABILITIES FOR SCIENCE NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURES

Digital Twins are an emerging area of modern science where a physical object (i.e., device, process, or infrastructure) is mated with a digital (virtual) version of that same object. Operation of the physical object can generate data to validate the virtual objects behavior while the virtual object allows rapid exploration of input parameters that might damage the physical object. It is this close interaction between the physical and virtual object that makes this Digital Twin environment so productive. DOE has a long history of building and operating high performance physical network infrastructures. The Energy Science Network (ESnet) supports the Office of Science lab complex and it also peers with other Research and Education networks (RENs) both domestically and internationally. ESnet also operates an internal 100G SDN network testbed and the NSF funded FABRIC external network testbed. Specifically: ESnet 100G SDN: The objective is to provide network researchers with a realistic environment for testing. Current testbed enables 100G application / middleware experiments, Science DMZ and SDN control/data plane experiments. FABRIC: The National Science Foundation (NSF) collaboration is building a national research infrastructure that will enable the computer science and networking community to develop and test novel architectures that could yield a faster, more secure Internet. What is missing is the virtual (Digital Twin) companion to these testbeds. This topic solicits applications that would create the network simulation capabilities that would accurately and reliably duplicate the operational and performance capabilities of these testbeds creating their Digital Twin. a. Network Simulation Tools Over the past few decades, the network research community has developed multiple network simulators (i.e., NS-3, OMNeT++, OPnet, ROSS) and emulators (i.e., Mininet) tools. While these tools have demonstrated value, there are limitations on the speed and capability that must be addressed for them to become an effective Digital Twin of one of these testbeds. In addition, there are new functionalities and devices (i.e.; P4 switches, Optical Add/Drop Muxes, security) that are integral components of these testbeds that need to be incorporated. To be an effective Digital Twin, the simulator/emulator must be as fast as, or faster than, the physical network. They should also be capable of evaluating new network link technologies or speeds (up to 1 Tbps links) that are expected in the next few years. Both of these testbeds span national (U.S.) and international (EU) boundaries. This means Round Trip Times range from a few msec to over 100 msec. It also means that the event rate can vary from 8.3M pkts/sec (1500 Byte Ethernet frames) to 1.9B pkts/sec (64 Byte Ethernet frames). These event rates will place a heavy burden on simple Discrete Event Simulators (DESs). Work on Parallel DES's, Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning (AI/ML) based surrogate models, and/or hybrid tools that automatically combine both methods are the focus of this subtopic. Specifications: The simulation/emulation tool(s) must meet the following criteria: Link Speed: equal to or 10x faster than the physical testbed Topology: exactly matches the physical testbed Node support: exactly match the operational capabilities of the installed routers, switches, and hosts. Protocol support: support the physical (optical), network (IPv4 and IPv6), transport (all current variants), and commonly used science applications. Event Rate: a minimum of 2 Billion events/sec (discrete or surrogate model) Applications are solicited to enhance or extend one or more existing simulation/emulation tools to create a Digital Twin of either the ESnet 100 G SDN testbed or the FABRIC testbed. Out of scope: Creation of a new simulation/emulation tool from scratch. Creation of a Digital Twin of other testbeds or infrastructures. Enhancements or extensions that only meet a subset of the specifications. Questions Contact: Richard Carlson, richard.carlson@science.doe.gov b. Other In addition to the specific subtopic listed above, the Department invites grant applications in other areas that fall within the scope of the topic description above.