Early research and development:
136-563: Merging the networks and creating the Internet: Commercialization, privatization, broader access leads to the modern Internet: Examples of Internet services: The National Science Foundation Network ( NSFNET ) was a program of coordinated, evolving projects sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) from 1985 to 1995 to promote advanced research and education networking in
272-450: A Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) PDP-11 computer, dataphone interfaces, and interfaces that would attach them directly to the mainframe computers. The cost was to be slightly less than the $ 300,000 ($ 2,353,700, adjusted for inflation) originally budgeted. Merit staff wrote the software that ran on the CCs, while staff at each of the universities wrote the mainframe software to interface to
408-594: A Routing Arbiter (RA) and ultimately made a joint award to the Merit Network and USC's Information Science Institute to act as the RA. To continue its promotion of advanced networking technology the NSF conducted a solicitation to create a very high-speed Backbone Network Service ( vBNS ) which, like NSFNET before it, would focus on providing service to the research and education community. MCI won this award and created
544-419: A 'merit review' process, the current version of which was introduced in 1997. Reviews are carried out by ad hoc reviewers and panels of independent scientists, engineers, and educators who are experts in the relevant fields of study, and who are selected by the NSF with particular attention to avoiding conflicts of interest. For example, reviewers cannot work at the NSF itself, nor for the institution that employs
680-481: A 155 Mbit/s ( OC3c ) and later a 622 Mbit/s ( OC12c ) and 2.5 Gbit/s ( OC48c ) ATM network to carry TCP/IP traffic primarily between the supercomputing centers and their users. NSF support was available to organizations that could demonstrate a need for very high speed networking capabilities and wished to connect to the vBNS or to the Abilene Network , the high speed network operated by
816-845: A T3 (45 Mbit/s), from the commercial ISP, internetMCI. In 1996 Merit became an affiliate member of Internet2 , in 1997 established its first connection to the NSF very high-speed Backbone Network Service (vBNS) , and in February 1999 began serving as Michigan's GigaPOP for Internet2 service. Following the NSFNET project Merit lead a number of activities with a national or international scope, including: In 2000, Merit spun off two for-profit companies: NextHop Technologies, which developed and marketed GateD routing software, and Interlink Networks, which specialized in authentication, authorization, and accounting (AAA) software. Eric Aupperle retired as president in 2001, after 27 years at Merit. He
952-707: A chemical spill that contaminated the drinking water of about 300,000 West Virginia residents. In early 2018, it was announced that Trump would cut NSF Research Funding by 30% but quickly rescinded this due to backlash. As of May 2018, Heather Wilson, the secretary of the Air Force, signed that letter of intent with the director of NSF initiating partnership for the research related to space operations and Geosciences , advanced material sciences , information and data sciences , and workforce and processes. The NSF seeks to fulfill its mission chiefly by issuing competitive, limited-term grants in response to specific proposals from
1088-745: A facilities based network, using fiber optic facilities that it shares with its members, that it purchases or leases under long-term agreements, or that it builds. In addition to network connectivity services, Merit offers a number of related services within Michigan and beyond, including: Internet2 connectivity, VPN , Network monitoring , Voice over IP (VOIP), Cloud storage , E-mail , Domain Name , Network Time , VMware and Zimbra software licensing, Colocation , and professional development seminars, workshops, classes, conferences, and meetings. The Michigan Educational Research Information Triad (MERIT)
1224-604: A foundation for a lifetime of integrated contributions. The NSF is broadly organized into four offices, seven directorates, and the National Science Board . It employs about 2,100 people in permanent, temporary and contractual positions at its headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia . Prior to 2017, its headquarters were located in Arlington, Virginia . In addition to around 1,400 permanent employees and
1360-465: A funding rate of 26.6%. According to FY 2020 numbers, the median annualized award size is $ 153,800 and the average duration of an award is 2.9 years. In 2022 the NSF has started funding open source software as part of their Pathways to Enable Open-Source Ecosystems (POSE) program. Although the federal government had established nearly 40 scientific organizations between 1910 and 1940, the US relied upon
1496-522: A group including the University of Illinois National Center for Supercomputing Applications ( NCSA ), Cornell University Theory Center , University of Delaware , and Merit Network . PDP-11/73 minicomputers with routing and management software, called Fuzzballs , served as the network routers since they already implemented the TCP/IP standard. This original 56 kbit/s backbone was overseen by
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#17327650312051632-582: A limited basis, with some of the regional Internet networks. In 1991, the Commercial Internet eXchange (CIX, pronounced "kicks") was created by PSINet, UUNET and CERFnet to provide a location at which multiple networks could exchange traffic free from traffic-based settlements and restrictions imposed by an acceptable use policy. In 1991, a new ISP, ANS CO+RE (commercial plus research), raised concerns and unique questions regarding commercial and non-commercial interoperability policies. ANS CO+RE
1768-500: A more broadly based Board of Directors than the Michigan-based Merit Network. Under its cooperative agreement with NSF, Merit remained ultimately responsible for the operation of NSFNET, but subcontracted much of the engineering and operations work to ANS. In 1991 the NSFNET backbone service was expanded to additional sites and upgraded to a more robust 45 Mbit/s ( T3 ) based network. The new T3 backbone
1904-476: A more broadly based Board of Directors than the Michigan-based Merit Network. Under its cooperative agreement with NSF, Merit remained ultimately responsible for the operation of NSFNET, but subcontracted much of the engineering and operations work to ANS. Both IBM and MCI made substantial new financial and other commitments to help support the new venture. Allan Weis left IBM to become ANS's first President and Managing Director. Douglas Van Houweling , former Chair of
2040-406: A more integrated approach than did most academic departments at the time, encouraging physicists, chemists, engineers, and metallurgists to cross departmental boundaries and use systems approaches to attack complex problems of materials synthesis or processing. The NSF expanded these laboratories into a nationwide network of Materials Research Science and Engineering Centers . In 1972 the NSF launched
2176-405: A new NSFNET backbone network. The new NSFNET backbone network service began July 1, 1988. It interconnected supercomputing centers around the country at 1.5 megabits per second ( T1 ), 24 times faster than the 56 kilobits-per-second speed of the previous network. The NSFNET backbone grew to link scientists and educators on university campuses nationwide and connect them to their counterparts around
2312-545: A new architecture and the NSFNET fiber optic backbone was decommissioned. At this point the NSFNET regional backbone networks were still central to the infrastructure of the expanding Internet, and there were still other NSFNET programs, but there was no longer a central NSFNET optical networking service. After the transition, network traffic was carried on the NSFNET fiber optic regional backbone networks and any of several commercial backbone networks, internetMCI , PSINet , SprintLink , ANSNet, and others. Traffic between networks
2448-526: A new solicitation to upgrade and expand NSFNET. As a result of a November 1987 NSF award to the Merit Network , a networking consortium by public universities in Michigan , the original 56 kbit/s network was expanded to include 13 nodes interconnected at 1.5 Mbit/s ( T-1 ) by July 1988. Additional links were added to form a multi-path network, and a node located in Atlanta was added. Each of
2584-641: A non-NSFNET attached network provider. In either case the situation was confusing and inefficient. It prevented economies of scale, increased costs, or both. And this slowed the growth of the Internet and its adoption by new classes of users, something no one was happy about. In 1988, Vint Cerf , then at the Corporation for National Research Initiatives (CNRI), proposed to the Federal Networking Council (FNC) and to MCI to interconnect
2720-575: A number of programs that support institution-wide research during this decade including the Graduate Science Facilities program (started in 1960), Institutional Grants for Science (started in 1961), and Science Development Grants, better known as Centers of Excellence program (started in 1964). Notable projects conducted during this decade include creation of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (1960), creation of
2856-509: A number of questions, and received written statements from all seven as well as from three others. At the end of the hearing, speaking to the two witnesses from NSF, Dr. Nico Habermann , Assistant NSF Director for the Computer and Information Science and Engineering Directorate (CISE), and Dr. Stephen Wolff , Director of NSF's Division of Networking & Communications Research & Infrastructure (DNCRI), Representative Boucher , Chairman of
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#17327650312052992-595: A partnership that included IBM , MCI , and the State of Michigan . Merit provided overall project coordination, network design and engineering, a Network Operations Center (NOC), and information services to assist the regional networks. IBM provided equipment, software development, installation, maintenance and operations support. MCI provided the T-1 data circuits at reduced rates. The state of Michigan provided funding for facilities and personnel. Eric M. Aupperle, Merit's President,
3128-525: A primarily laissez-faire approach to scientific research and development. Academic research in science and engineering occasionally received federal funding. Within University laboratories, almost all support came from private contributions and charitable foundations. In industrial laboratories, the concentration of workers and funding (some through military and government programs as a result of Roosevelt 's New Deal ) would eventually raise concern during
3264-431: A proposal to reduce the NSF social sciences directorate's budget by 75%. Economist Robert A. Moffit suggests a connection between this proposal and Democratic Senator William Proxmire's Golden Fleece Award series criticizing "frivolous" government spending — Proxmire's first Golden Fleece had been awarded to the NSF in 1975 for granting $ 84,000 to a social science project investigating why people fall in love. Ultimately,
3400-534: A result, there was at times serious congestion on the overloaded T-1 backbone. Following the transition to T-3, portions of the T-1 backbone were left in place to act as a backup for the new T-3 backbone. In anticipation of the T-3 upgrade and the approaching end of the 5-year NSFNET cooperative agreement, in September 1990 Merit, IBM, and MCI formed Advanced Network and Services (ANS), a new non-profit corporation with
3536-412: A search engine that used the links between Web pages as a ranking method, which they later commercialized under the name Google . In 1996 NSF-funded research established beyond doubt that the chemistry of the atmosphere above Antarctica was grossly abnormal and that levels of key chlorine compounds are greatly elevated. During two months of intense work, NSF researchers learned most of what is known about
3672-489: A time ANS CO+RE refused to connect to the CIX and the CIX refused to purchase a connection to ANS CO+RE. In May 1992 Mitch Kapor and Al Weis forged an agreement where ANS would connect to the CIX as a "trial" with the ability to disconnect at a moment's notice and without the need to join the CIX as a member. This compromise resolved things for a time, but later the CIX started to block access from regional networks that had not paid
3808-508: A time this state of affairs kept the networking community as a whole from fully implementing the vision for the Internet as a worldwide network of fully interconnected TCP/IP networks allowing any connected site to communicate with any other connected site. These issues would not be fully resolved until a new network architecture was developed and the NSFNET Backbone Service was turned off in 1995. The NSFNET Backbone Service
3944-402: A variety of perspectives. Themes include disagreements over administrative structure, patents and inclusion of social sciences, a populist -versus-scientist dispute, as well as the roles of political parties, Congress, and President Truman . Commonly, this debate is characterized by the conflict between New Deal Senator Harley M. Kilgore and OSRD head Vannevar Bush . Narratives about
4080-736: A whole. Examples of national facilities include the NSF's national observatories, with their giant optical and radio telescopes; its Antarctic research sites; its high-end computer facilities and ultra-high-speed network connections; the ships and submersibles used for ocean research; and its gravitational wave observatories. In addition to researchers and research facilities, NSF grants also support science, engineering and mathematics education from pre-K through graduate school. Undergraduates can receive funding through Research Experiences for Undergraduates summer programs. Graduate students are supported through Integrative Graduate Education Research Traineeships (IGERT) and Alliance for Graduate Education and
4216-634: Is an independent agency of the United States federal government that supports fundamental research and education in all the non-medical fields of science and engineering. Its medical counterpart is the National Institutes of Health. With an annual budget of about $ 9.9 billion (fiscal year 2023), the NSF funds approximately 25% of all federally supported basic research conducted by the United States' colleges and universities. In some fields, such as mathematics, computer science, economics, and
National Science Foundation Network - Misplaced Pages Continue
4352-473: Is by a non-profit college, university, K-12 school, or library. While these AUP provisions seem reasonable, in some specific cases, they often proved difficult to interpret and enforce. NSF did not monitor the content of traffic that was sent over NSFNET or actively police the use of the network. Further, NSF did not require Merit or the regional networks to do so. NSF, Merit, and the regional networks did investigate possible cases of inappropriate use, when such use
4488-453: Is essential for the nation's economic health and global competitiveness, and for national defense. This support has manifested in an expanding National Science Foundation budget from $ 1 billion in 1983 to $ 8.28 billion in 2020. NSF has published annual reports since 1950, which since the new millennium have been two reports, variously called "Performance Report" and "Accountability Report" or "Performance Highlights" and "Financial Highlights";
4624-499: Is one of the principal U.S. statistical agencies . It is a part of the NSF's Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences Directorate (SBE). In May 2011, Republican Senator Tom Coburn released a 73-page report, " National Science Foundation: Under the Microscope ", receiving immediate attention from such media outlets as The New York Times , Fox News , and MSNBC . The report found fault with various research projects and
4760-727: The Antarctic Treaty reserving Antarctica for peaceful and scientific research, and a presidential directive gave the NSF responsibility for virtually all U.S. Antarctic operations and research in form of the United States Antarctic Program . In 1963, President John F. Kennedy appointed Leland John Haworth as the second director of the NSF. During the 1960s, the impact of the Sputnik Crisis spurred international competition in science and technology and accelerated NSF growth. The NSF initiated
4896-556: The Gemini Observatory and the Arecibo Observatory , all of which are funded in whole or in part by NSF. The NSF's astronomy program forged a close working relationship with NASA , also founded in 1958, in that the NSF provides virtually all the U.S. federal support for ground-based astronomy, while NASA's responsibility is the U.S. effort in space-based astronomy. In 1959 the U.S. and other nations concluded
5032-559: The National Defense Research Committee and the Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) both from 1941 to 1947. Despite broad agreement over the principle of federal support for science, working out a consensus on how to organize and manage it required five years. The five-year political debate over the creation of a national scientific agency has been a topic for academic study, understood from
5168-511: The National Nanotechnology Initiative , dedicated to the understanding and control of matter at the atomic and molecular scale. NSF's roughly $ 300 million annual investment in nanotechnology research was still one of the largest in the 23-agency initiative. In 2001, NSF's appropriation passed $ 4 billion. The NSF's "Survey of Public Attitudes Toward and Understanding of Science and Technology" revealed that
5304-705: The ozone hole . In 1998 two independent teams of NSF-supported astronomers discovered that the expansion of the universe was actually speeding up, as if some previously unknown force, now known as dark energy , is driving the galaxies apart at an ever-increasing rate. Since passage of the Small Business Technology Transfer Act of 1992 (Public Law 102–564, Title II), NSF has been required to reserve 0.3% of its extramural research budget for Small Business Technology Transfer awards, and 2.8% of its R&D budget for small business innovation research. NSF joined with other federal agencies in
5440-642: The supercomputing centers funded by NSF in the United States. In 1985, NSF began funding the creation of five new supercomputing centers: Also in 1985, under the leadership of Dennis Jennings , the NSF established the National Science Foundation Network (NSFNET). NSFNET was to be a general-purpose research network, a hub to connect the five supercomputing centers along with the NSF-funded National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) to each other and to
5576-444: The "Science Mobilization Act" (S. 1297), which did not pass. Perceiving organizational chaos, elitism, over-concentration of funds in elite universities, and lack of incentives for socially applicable research, Kilgore envisioned a comprehensive and centralized research body supporting basic and applied research which would be controlled by members of the public and civil servants rather than scientific experts. The public would own
National Science Foundation Network - Misplaced Pages Continue
5712-422: The $ 10,000 fee to become members of the CIX. Meanwhile, Congress passed its Scientific and Advanced-Technology Act of 1992 that formally permitted NSF to connect to commercial networks in support of research and education. The creation of ANS CO+RE and its initial refusal to connect to the CIX was one of the factors that lead to the controversy described later in this article . Other issues had to do with: For
5848-585: The 2007 fiscal year (October 1, 2006, through September 30, 2007), and in 2007 NSF requested $ 6.43 billion for FY 2008. President Obama requested $ 7.373 billion for fiscal year 2013. Due to the October 1, 2013 shutdown of the Federal Government, and NSF's lapse in funding, their website was down "until further notice", but was brought back online after the US government passed their budget. In 2014, NSF awarded rapid response grants to study
5984-507: The AUP is that it cites acceptable uses of the network that are not directly related to who or what type of organization is making that use. Use from for-profit organizations is acceptable when it is in support of open research and education. Additionally, some uses, such as fundraising, advertising, public relations activities, extensive personal or private use, for-profit consulting, and all illegal activities were never acceptable, even when that use
6120-661: The CCs. The first completed connection linked the IBM S/360-67 mainframe computers running the Michigan Terminal System at WSU and U-M, and was publicly demonstrated on December 14, 1971. The MSU node was completed in October 1972, adding a CDC 6500 mainframe running Scope/Hustler . The network was officially dedicated on May 15, 1973. In 1974, Herzog returned to teaching in the University of Michigan's Industrial Engineering Department, and Aupperle
6256-726: The Division of Environmental Sciences (1965), deep sea exploration endeavors Project Mohole (1961) and the Deep Sea Drilling Project (1968–1983), the Ecosystems Analysis Program (1969), and ownership of the Arecibo Observatory (1969). In 1969, Franklin Long was tentatively selected to take over directorship of the NSF. His nomination caused some controversy due to his opposition to the current administration's antiballistic missile program and
6392-672: The IBM Global Network as well as Merit's own expanding network of dial-in sites in Michigan, New York City , and Washington, D.C. In 1978, Western Michigan University (WMU) became the fourth member of Merit (prompting a name change, as the acronym Merit no longer made sense as the group was no longer a triad). To expand the network, the Merit staff developed new hardware interfaces for the Digital PDP-11 based on printed circuit technology. The new system became known as
6528-524: The Internet , which still exists, evolved as one of its largest critics. Other writers, such as Chetly Zarko, a University of Michigan alumnus and freelance investigative writer, offered their own critiques. On March 12, 1992 the Subcommittee on Science of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives , held a hearing to review the management of NSFNET. Witnesses at
6664-469: The Internet with a local phone call. And by the end of 2001 there were 10,733 MichNet shared dial-in lines in over 200 Michigan cities plus New York City , Washington, D.C. , and Windsor, Ontario , Canada. As an outgrowth of this work, in 1997, Merit created the Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting (AAA) Consortium . During 1994 an expanded K-12 outreach program at Merit helped lead
6800-756: The Merit Network Board and Vice Provost for Information Technology at the University of Michigan , was Chairman of the ANS Board of Directors. The new T-3 backbone was named ANSNet and provided the physical infrastructure used by Merit to deliver the NSFNET Backbone Service. In addition to the five NSF supercomputer centers (which operated regional networks, e.g., SDSCnet and NCSAnet), NSFNET provided connectivity to eleven regional networks and through these networks to many smaller regional and campus networks. The NSFNET regional networks were: The NSF's appropriations act authorized NSF to "foster and support
6936-633: The Merit engineering staff. At the February 1994 regional techs meeting in San Diego, the group revised its charter to include a broader base of network service providers, and subsequently adopted NANOG as its new name. Also starting in 1994, Merit developed the Routing Assets Database (RADb) as part of the NSF-funded Routing Arbiter Project. MichNet obtained its initial commodity Internet access,
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#17327650312057072-453: The Merit staff and the staffs at the three universities. Over the next dozen years the initial network grew as new services such as dial-in terminal support, remote job submission, remote printing, and file transfer were added; as gateways to the national and international Tymnet , Telenet , and Datapac networks were established, as support for the X.25 and TCP/IP protocols was added; as additional computers such as WSU's MVS system and
7208-594: The Michigan Educational Research Information Triad by Michigan State University (MSU), the University of Michigan (U-M), and Wayne State University (WSU), Merit was created to investigate resource sharing by connecting the mainframe computers at these three Michigan public research universities . Merit's initial three node packet-switched computer network was operational in October 1972 using custom hardware based on DEC PDP-11 minicomputers and software developed by
7344-460: The NAPs, but in either case they would need to pay for their own connection infrastructure. NSF provided some funding for the NAPs and interim funding to help the regional networks make the transition, but did not fund the new commercial backbone networks directly. To help ensure the stability of the Internet during and immediately after the transition from NSFNET, NSF conducted a solicitation to select
7480-462: The NSF delivered ozone sensors, along with balloons and helium, to researchers at the South Pole so they can measure stratospheric ozone loss. This was in response to findings earlier that year, indicating a steep drop in ozone over a period of several years. The Internet project continued, now known as NSFNET . In 1990 the NSF's appropriation passed $ 2 billion for the first time. NSF funded
7616-613: The NSF has 53 existing contracts. The NSF also supports research through several offices within the Office of the Director, including the Office of Integrative Activities, and Office of International Science and Engineering. The NSF organizes its research and education support through eight directorates, each encompassing several disciplines: An eighth directorate, the Directorate for Technology, Innovation and Partnerships (TIP),
7752-419: The NSFNET backbone service. MichNet, Merit's regional network in Michigan was attached to NSFNET and in the early 1990s Merit began extending "the Internet" throughout Michigan, offering both direct connect and dial-in services, and upgrading the statewide network from 56 kbit/s to 1.5 Mbit/s, and on to 45, 155, 622 Mbit/s, and eventually 1 and 10 Gbit/s. In 2003 Merit began its transition to
7888-558: The NSFNET backbone supported the OSI Connectionless Network Protocol (CLNP) in addition to TCP/IP. However, CLNP usage remained low when compared to TCP/IP. Traffic on the network continued its rapid growth, doubling every seven months. Projections indicated that the T-1 backbone would become overloaded sometime in 1990. A critical routing technology, Border Gateway Protocol (BGP), originated during this period of Internet history. BGP allowed routers on
8024-487: The NSFNET backbone to differentiate routes originally learned via multiple paths. Prior to BGP, interconnection between IP network was inherently hierarchical, and careful planning was needed to avoid routing loops. BGP turned the Internet into a meshed topology, moving away from the centric architecture which the ARPANET emphasized. During 1991, an upgraded backbone built with 45 Mbit/s ( T-3 ) transmission circuits
8160-784: The NSFNET. Three new nodes were added as part of the upgrade to T-3: NEARNET in Cambridge, Massachusetts; Argone National Laboratory outside of Chicago; and SURAnet in Atlanta, Georgia. NSFNET connected to other federal government networks including the NASA Science Internet, the Energy Science Network ( ESnet ), and others. Connections were also established to research and education networks in other countries starting in 1988 with Canada, France, NORDUnet (serving Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden),
8296-634: The National Science Foundation prior to the 1970s typically concentrated on Vannevar Bush and his 1945 publication Science—The Endless Frontier. In this report, Vannevar Bush, then head of the Office of Scientific Research and Development which began the Manhattan Project , addressed plans for the postwar years to further foster government commitment to science and technology. Issued to President Harry S. Truman in July 1945,
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#17327650312058432-549: The National Science Foundation. which provided for a National Science Board of twenty-four part-time members. In 1951 Truman nominated Alan T. Waterman , chief scientist at the Office of Naval Research , to become the first Director. With the Korean War underway, the agency's initial budget was just $ 151,000 for 9 months. After moving its administrative offices twice, NSF began its first full year of operations with an appropriation from Congress of $ 3.5 million, far less
8568-1022: The Netherlands, and many other countries in subsequent years. Two Federal Internet Exchanges (FIXes) were established in June 1989 under the auspices of the Federal Engineering Planning Group (FEPG). FIX East, at the University of Maryland in College Park and FIX West, at the NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California . The existence of NSFNET and the FIXes allowed the ARPANET to be phased out in mid-1990. Starting in August 1990
8704-641: The OMB's 75% reduction proposal failed, but the NSF Economics Program budget did fall 40%. In 2012, political science research was barred from NSF funding by the passage of the Flake Amendment, breaking the precedent of granting the NSF autonomy to determine its own priorities. In fiscal year 2020, NSF received 42,400 proposals and awarded 12,100, for a funding rate of 28%. In FY 2021, the estimates are 43,200 and 11,500 respectively, giving
8840-518: The PDP-11 and LSI-11 based PCPs and SCPs. This was also the start of relentless upgrades to higher and higher speeds, first from 56 kbit/s to T1 (1.5 Mbit/s) followed by multiple T1s (3.0 to 10.5 Mbit/s), T3 (45 Mbit/s), OC3c (155 Mbit/s), OC12c (622 Mbit/s), and eventually one and ten gigabits (1000 to 10,000 Mbit/s). In 1993 Merit's first Network Access Server (NAS) using RADIUS (Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service)
8976-676: The Primary Communications Processor (PCP), with the earliest PCPs connecting a PDP-10 located at WMU and a DEC VAX running UNIX at U-M's Electrical Engineering department. A second hardware technology initiative in 1983 produced the smaller Secondary Communication Processors (SCP) based on DEC LSI-11 processors. The first SCP was installed at the Michigan Union in Ann Arbor , creating UMnet, which extended Merit's network connectivity deeply into
9112-411: The Professoriate (AGEP) programs and through the Graduate Research Fellowships, NSF-GRF . K–12 and some community college instructors are eligible to participate in compensated Research Experiences for Teachers programs. In addition, an early career-development program (CAREER) supports teacher-scholars that most effectively integrate research and education within the mission of their organization, as
9248-425: The Smith bill made it to President Truman's desk, but it was vetoed. Truman wrote that regrettably, the proposed agency would have been "divorced from control by the people to an extent that implies a distinct lack of faith in the democratic process". The third attempt began with the introduction of S. 2385 in 1948. This was a compromise bill cosponsored by Smith and Kilgore, and Bush aide John Teeter had contributed in
9384-414: The U-M campus. In 1983 Merit's PCP and SCP software was enhanced to support TCP/IP and Merit interconnected with the ARPANET . In 1986 Merit engineered and operated leased lines and satellite links that allowed the University of Michigan to access the supercomputing facilities at Pittsburgh , San Diego , and NCAR . In 1987, Merit, IBM and MCI submitted a winning proposal to NSF to implement
9520-429: The UM's electrical engineering's VAX running UNIX were attached; and as new universities became Merit members. Merit's involvement in national networking activities started in the mid-1980s with connections to the national supercomputing centers and work on the 56 kbit/s National Science Foundation Network (NSFNET), the forerunner of today's Internet . From 1987 until April 1995, Merit re-engineered and managed
9656-442: The United States. The program created several nationwide backbone computer networks in support of these initiatives. It was created to link researchers to the NSF-funded supercomputing centers. Later, with additional public funding and also with private industry partnerships, the network developed into a major part of the Internet backbone . The National Science Foundation permitted only government agencies and universities to use
9792-563: The University Corporation for Advanced Internet Development ( UCAID , aka Internet2 ). At the February 1994 regional techs meeting in San Diego, the group revised its charter to include a broader base of network service providers, and subsequently adopted North American Network Operators' Group (NANOG) as its new name. Elise Gerich and Mark Knopper were the founders of NANOG and its first coordinators, followed by Bill Norton, Craig Labovitz , and Susan Harris. For much of
9928-399: The ability to connect to hosts or other networks over groups of asynchronous ports and via X.25 were added. Merit interconnected with Telenet (later SprintNet) in 1976 to give Merit users dial-in access from locations around the United States. Dial-in access within the U.S. and internationally was further expanded via Merit's interconnections to Tymnet , ADP's Autonet, and later still
10064-400: The agency's move to a more nimble international posture. Rather than maintain dedicated offices, NSF will dispatch small teams to specific international institutions. Teams may work for up to a week on-site to evaluate research and explore collaborations with the institution. In addition to the research it funds in specific disciplines, the NSF has launched a number of projects that coordinate
10200-414: The almost $ 33.5 million requested with which 28 research grants were awarded. After the 1957 Soviet Union orbited Sputnik 1 , the first ever human-made satellite, national self-appraisal questioned American education, scientific, technical and industrial strength and Congress increased the NSF appropriation for 1958 to $ 40 million. In 1958 the NSF selected Kitt Peak , near Tucson, Arizona , as
10336-480: The backbone nodes was a router called the Nodal Switching System (NSS). The NSSes were a collection of multiple (typically nine) IBM RT PC systems connected by a Token Ring local area network . The RT PCs ran AOS , IBM's version of Berkeley UNIX , and was dedicated to a particular packet processing task. Under its cooperative agreement with NSF the Merit Network was the lead organization in
10472-427: The best judges of the direction and needs of their field. While Bush and Kilgore both agreed on the need for a national science policy, Bush maintained that scientists should continue to own the research results and patents , wanted project selection limited to scientists, and focused support on basic research, not the social sciences, leaving the market to support applied projects. Sociologist Daniel Kleinman divides
10608-454: The biennial "Science & Engineering Indicators" report to the US president and Congress, as required by the NSF Act of 1950. In 1977 the first interconnection of unrelated networks was developed, run by DARPA . During this decade, increasing NSF involvement lead to a three-tiered system of internetworks managed by a mix of universities, nonprofit organizations, and government agencies. By
10744-473: The commercial MCI Mail system to NSFNET. MCI provided funding and FNC provided permission and in the summer of 1989, this linkage was made. In effect, the FNC permitted experimental use of the NSFNET backbone to carry commercial email traffic into and out of the NSFNET. Other email providers such as Telenet 's Telemail, Tymnet 's OnTyme and CompuServe also obtained permission to establish experimental gateways for
10880-531: The debate into three broad legislative attempts. The first attempt consisted of the 1945 Magnuson bill (S. 1285), the 1945 Science and Technology Mobilization Bill, a 1945 compromise bill (S. 1720), a 1946 compromise bill (S. 1850), and the Mills Bill (H.B. 6448). The Magnuson bill was sponsored by Senator Warren Magnuson and drafted by the OSRD, headed by Vannevar Bush. The Science and Technology Mobilization bill
11016-437: The development and use of computer and other scientific and engineering methods and technologies, primarily for research and education in the sciences and engineering." This allowed NSF to support NSFNET and related networking initiatives, but only to the extent that that support was " primarily for research and education in the sciences and engineering ." And this in turn was taken to mean that use of NSFNET for commercial purposes
11152-768: The development of several curricula based on the NCTM standards , devised by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics . These standards were widely adopted by school districts during the subsequent decade. However, in what newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal called the "math wars", organizations such as Mathematically Correct complained that some elementary texts based on the standards, including Mathland , had almost entirely abandoned any instruction of traditional arithmetic in favor of cutting, coloring, pasting, and writing. During that debate, NSF
11288-677: The drafting process. In 1949, S. 247 was introduced by the same group of senators behind S. 2385, marking the fourth and final effort to establish a national science agency. Essentially identical to S. 2385, S. 247 passed the Senate and the House with a few amendments. It was signed by President Truman on May 10, 1950. Kleinman points out that the final NSF bill closely resembles Vannevar Bush's proposals. (Harley Kilgore) (Vannevar Bush) 1950 Business, labor, farmers, consumers In 1950 Harry S. Truman signed Public Law 507, or 42 U.S.C. 16 creating
11424-524: The efforts of experts in many disciplines, which often involve collaborations with other U.S. federal agencies. Examples include initiatives in: NSF's National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics (NCSES) gathers data from surveys and partnerships with other agencies to offer official data on the American science and engineering workforce, graduates of advanced U.S. science and engineering programs, and R&D expenditures by U.S. industry. NCSES
11560-616: The first freely available browser to allow World Wide Web pages that include both graphics and text. Within 18 months, NCSA Mosaic becomes the Web browser of choice for more than a million users, and sets off an exponential growth in the number of Web users. In 1994 NSF, together with DARPA and NASA , launched the Digital Library Initiative. One of the first six grants went to Stanford University , where two graduate students, Larry Page and Sergey Brin , began to develop
11696-753: The formation of six regional K-12 groups known as Hubs. The Hubs and Merit applied for and were awarded funding from the Ratepayer fund, which as part of a settlement of an earlier Ameritech of Michigan ratepayer overcharge, had been established by Michigan Public Service Commission to further the K-12 community's network connectivity. During the 1990s, Merit added Grand Valley State University (1994), Northern Michigan University (1994), Lake Superior State University (1997), and Ferris State University (1998) as members. By 1999, Merit had 163 affiliate members, with 401 attachments from 353 separate locations. Merit
11832-574: The foundation, while the NSB meets six times a year to establish its overall policies. The current NSF director is Sethuraman Panchanathan. The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) was established by the National Science Foundation Act of 1950. Its stated mission is "to promote the progress of science, to advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare, and to secure the national defense." The NSF's scope has expanded over
11968-505: The goals and aims of the agency and published a revised version of the merit review criteria in its 2012 report, to clarify and improve the function of the criteria. However, both criteria already had been mandated for all NSF merit review procedures in the 2010 re-authorization of the America COMPETES Act . The Act also includes an emphasis on promoting potentially transformative research , a phrase which has been included in
12104-460: The hearing were asked to focus on the agreement(s) that NSF put in place for the operation of the NSFNET backbone, the foundation's plan for recompetition of those agreements, and to help the subcommittee explore whether the NSF's policies provided a level playing field for network service providers, ensured that the network was responsive to user needs, and provided for effective network management. The subcommittee heard from seven witnesses, asked them
12240-417: The latest available FY 2013 Agency Financial Report was posted December 16, 2013, and the six-page FY 2013 Performance and Financial Highlights was posted March 25, 2013. More recently, the NSF has focused on obtaining high return on investment from their spending on scientific research. Various bills have sought to direct funds within the NSF. In 1981, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) introduced
12376-517: The mid-1980s, primary financial support for the growing project was assumed by the NSF. In 1983, NSF budget topped $ 1 billion for the first time. Major increases in the nation's research budget were proposed as "the country recognizes the importance of research in science and technology, and education". The U.S. Antarctic Program was taken out of the NSF appropriation now requiring a separate appropriation. The NSF received more than 27,000 proposals and funded more than 12,000 of them in 1983. In 1985,
12512-421: The modern Internet: Examples of Internet services: Merit Network , Inc., is a nonprofit member-governed organization providing high-performance computer networking and related services to educational , government , health care , and nonprofit organizations , primarily in Michigan . Created in 1966, Merit operates the longest running regional computer network in the United States. Created in 1966 as
12648-403: The most recent incarnation of the 'merit review' criteria. Most NSF grants go to individuals or small groups of investigators, who carry out research at their home campuses. Other grants provide funding for mid-scale research centers, instruments, and facilities that serve researchers from many institutions. Still, others fund national-scale facilities that are shared by the research community as
12784-545: The network until 1989 when the first commercial Internet service provider emerged. By 1991, the NSF removed access restrictions and the commercial ISP business grew rapidly. Following the deployment of the Computer Science Network (CSNET), a network that provided Internet services to academic computer science departments, in 1981, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) aimed to create an academic research network facilitating access by researchers to
12920-607: The number of PCPs and SCPs in service reached a high of roughly 290 in 1991, supporting a total of about 13,000 asynchronous ports and numerous LAN and WAN gateways. In 1994 the Merit Board endorsed a plan to expand the MichNet shared dial-in service, leading to a rapid expansion of the Internet dial-in service over the next several years. In 1994 there were 38 shared dial-in sites. By 1996 there were 131 shared dial-in sites and more than 92% of Michigan residents could reach
13056-399: The organization's name to Merit Network, Inc., and created the name MichNet to refer to Merit's statewide network. The board also approved a staff proposal to allow organizations other than publicly supported universities, referred to as affiliates , to be served by MichNet without prior board approval. 1992 saw major upgrades of the MichNet backbone to use Cisco routers in addition to
13192-513: The period from 1987 to 1995, following the opening up of the Internet through NSFNET and in particular after the creation of the for-profit ANS CO+RE in May 1991, some Internet stakeholders were concerned over the effects of privatization and the manner in which ANS, IBM, and MCI received a perceived competitive advantage in leveraging federal research money to gain ground in fields in which other companies allegedly were more competitive. The Cook Report on
13328-472: The principal Internet backbone starting in the Summer of 1986, when MIDnet , the first NSFNET regional backbone network became operational. By 1988, in addition to the five NSF supercomputer centers, NSFNET included connectivity to the regional networks BARRNet, JVNCNet, Merit/MichNet , MIDnet, NCAR, NorthWestNet, NYSERNet, SESQUINET, SURAnet, and Westnet, which in turn connected about 170 additional networks to
13464-438: The proposing researchers. All proposal evaluations are confidential: the proposing researchers may see them, but they do not see the names of the reviewers. The first merit review criterion is 'intellectual merit', the second is that of the 'broader societal impact' of the proposed research; the latter reflects a broader global trend for funding agencies to demand evidence of research 'impact' and has been met with opposition from
13600-531: The public had a positive attitude toward science, but a poor understanding of it. During 2004–5 NSF sent "rapid response" research teams to investigate the aftermath of the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster and Hurricane Katrina . An NSF-funded engineering team helped uncover why the levees failed in New Orleans . In 2005, NSF's budget stood at $ 5.6 billion, in 2006 it stood at $ 5.91 billion for
13736-514: The regional research and education networks that would in turn connect campus networks. Using this three tier network architecture NSFNET would provide access between the supercomputer centers and other sites over the backbone network at no cost to the centers or to the regional networks using the open TCP/IP protocols initially deployed successfully on the ARPANET . The NSFNET initiated operations in 1986 using TCP/IP . Its six backbone sites were interconnected with leased 56- kbit/s links, built by
13872-522: The report made a strong case for federally-funded scientific research, arguing that the nation would reap rich dividends in the form of better health care, a more vigorous economy, and a stronger national defense. It proposed creating a new federal agency, the National Research Foundation. The NSF first appeared as a comprehensive New Deal Policy proposed by Sen. Harley Kilgore of West Virginia. In 1942, Senator Kilgore introduced
14008-667: The research community and establishing cooperative agreements with research organizations. It does not operate its own laboratories, unlike other federal research agencies, notable examples being NASA and the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The NSF uses four main mechanisms to communicate funding opportunities and generate proposals: dear colleague letters, program descriptions, program announcements, and program solicitations. The NSF receives over 50,000 such proposals each year, and funds about 10,000 of them. Those funded are typically projects that are ranked highest in
14144-550: The rights to all patents funded by public monies and research monies would be equitably spread across universities. Kilgore's supporters included non-elite universities, small businesses, and the Budget Bureau. His proposals received mixed support. Vannevar Bush opposed Kilgore, preferring science policy driven by experts and scientists rather than public and civil servants. Bush was concerned that public interests would politicize science, and believed that scientists would be
14280-418: The same purpose at about the same time. The interesting side effect of these links to NSFNET was that the users of the heretofore disconnected commercial email services were able to exchange email with one another via the Internet. Coincidentally, three commercial Internet service providers emerged in the same general time period: AlterNet (built by UUNET ), PSINet and CERFnet . During the period when NSFNET
14416-455: The scientific and policy communities since its inception in 1997. In June 2010, the National Science Board (NSB), the governing body for NSF and science advisers to both the legislative and executive branches, convened a 'Task Force on Merit Review' to determine "how well the current Merit Review criteria used by the NSF to evaluate all proposals were serving the agency." The task force reinforced its support for both criteria as appropriate for
14552-684: The site of the first national observatory, that would give any astronomer unprecedented access to state-of-the-art telescopes; previously major research telescopes were privately funded, available only to astronomers who taught at the universities that ran them. The idea expanded to encompass the National Optical Astronomy Observatory , the National Radio Astronomy Observatory , the National Solar Observatory ,
14688-585: The social sciences, the NSF is the major source of federal backing. NSF's director and deputy director are appointed by the president of the United States and confirmed by the United States Senate, whereas the 24 president-appointed members of the National Science Board (NSB) do not require U.S. Senate confirmation. The director and deputy director are responsible for administration, planning, budgeting and day-to-day operations of
14824-630: The softbound "Internet Manager's Phonebook" which listed the contact information for every issued domain name and IP address in 1990. Incidentally, Ed Krol also authored the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Internet to help users of the NSFNET understand its capabilities. The Hitchhiker's Guide became one of the first help manuals for the Internet . As regional networks grew the 56 kbit/s NSFNET backbone experienced rapid increases in network traffic and became seriously congested. In June 1987 NSF issued
14960-553: The staffs of the NSB office and the Office of the Inspector General , NSF's workforce includes some 200 scientists on temporary duty and 450 contract workers. Scientists from research institutions can join the NSF as temporary program directors, called "rotators", overseeing the merit review process and searching for new funding opportunities. These assignments typically last one–two years, but may extend to four. The NSF also offers contracting opportunities. As of May 2018,
15096-523: The subcommittee, said: … I think you should be very proud of what you have accomplished. Even those who have some constructive criticism of the way that the network is presently managed acknowledge at the outset that you have done a terrific job in accomplishing the goal of this NSFNET, and its user-ship is enormously up, its cost to the users has come down, and you certainly have our congratulations for that excellent success. National Science Foundation The U.S. National Science Foundation ( NSF )
15232-494: The supercomputer centers themselves with the lead taken by Ed Krol at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign . PDP-11/73 Fuzzball routers were configured and run by Hans-Werner Braun at the Merit Network and statistics were collected by Cornell University . Support for NSFNET end-users was provided by the NSF Network Service Center (NNSC), located at BBN Technologies and included publishing
15368-460: The use was not extensive. The prohibition on commercial use of the NSFNET backbone meant that some organizations could not connect to the Internet via regional networks that were connected to the NSFNET backbone, while to be fully connected other organizations (or regional networks on their behalf), including some non-profit research and educational institutions, would need to obtain two connections, one to an NSFNET attached regional network and one to
15504-593: The wartime period. In particular, concerns were raised that industry laboratories were largely allowed full patent rights of technologies developed with federal funds. These concerns, in part, led to efforts like Senator Harley M. Kilgore 's "Science Mobilization Act". Amidst growing awareness that US military capability depended on strength in science and engineering, Congress considered several proposals to support research in these fields. Separately, President Franklin D. Roosevelt sponsored creation of organizations to coordinate federal funding of science for war, including
15640-559: The world. The NSFNET project caused substantial growth at Merit, nearly tripling the staff and leading to the establishment of a new 24-hour Network Operations Center at the U-M Computer Center. In September 1990 in anticipation of the NSFNET T3 upgrade and the approaching end of the 5-year NSFNET cooperative agreement, Merit, IBM, and MCI formed Advanced Network and Services (ANS), a new non-profit corporation with
15776-410: The years to include many areas that were not in its initial portfolio, including the social and behavioral sciences, engineering, and science and mathematics education. The NSF is the only U.S. federal agency with a mandate to support all non-medical fields of research. Since the technology boom of the 1980s, the U.S. Congress has generally embraced the premise that government-funded basic research
15912-487: Was not allowed. To ensure that NSF support was used appropriately, NSF developed the NSFNET Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) that outlined in broad terms the uses of NSFNET that were and were not allowed. The AUP was revised several times to make it clearer and to allow the broadest possible use of NSFNET, consistent with Congress' wishes as expressed in the appropriations act. A notable feature of
16048-529: Was appointed President Emeritus by the Merit board. Hunt Williams became Merit's new president. In 2004 Michael R. McPherson was named Merit's interim president and CEO. In January 2005 Merit and Internet2 moved into the new Michigan Information Technology Center (MITC) in Ann Arbor. In 2006, Dr. Donald J. Welch was named president and CEO of Merit Network, Inc. In December 2006 Merit and OSTN partner to provide IPTV to Michigan institutions. OSTN
16184-525: Was appointed as director. Use of the all uppercase name "MERIT" was abandoned in favor of the mixed case "Merit". The first network connections were host to host interactive connections which allowed person to remote computer or local computer to remote computer interactions. To this, terminal to host connections, batch connections (remote job submission, remote printing, batch file transfer), and interactive file copy were added. And, in addition to connecting to host computers over custom hardware interfaces,
16320-420: Was being established, Internet service providers that allowed commercial traffic began to emerge, such as Alternet, PSINet , CERFNet, and others. The commercial networks in many cases were interconnected to the NSFNET and routed traffic over the NSFNET nominally accordingly to the NSFNET acceptable use policy Additionally, these early commercial networks often directly interconnected with each other as well as, on
16456-525: Was both lauded and criticized for favoring the standards. In 1991 the NSFNET acceptable use policy was altered to allow commercial traffic. By 1995, with private, commercial market thriving, NSF decommissioned the NSFNET, allowing for public use of the Internet. In 1993 students and staff at the NSF-supported National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, developed Mosaic ,
16592-461: Was brought to their attention. An example may help to illustrate the problem. Is it acceptable for a parent to exchange e-mail with a child enrolled at a college or university, if that exchange uses the NSFNET backbone? It would be acceptable, if the subject of the e-mail was the student's instruction or a research project. Even if the subject was not instruction or research, the e-mail still might be acceptable as private or personal business as long as
16728-496: Was created in 2022 to accelerate the transition of basic research into real world impact. It has a primary goal of the support of use-inspired research and the translation of research results to the market and society. Prior to October 2018, NSF maintained three overseas offices to promote collaboration between the science and engineering communities of the United States and other continents' scientific communities: All three overseas offices were shut down in October 2018, to reflect
16864-472: Was critical of the social sciences. It started a controversy about political bias and a Congressional Inquiry into federally sponsored research. In 2014, Republicans proposed a bill to limit the NSF Board's authority in grant-writing. Merit Network Early research and development: Merging the networks and creating the Internet: Commercialization, privatization, broader access leads to
17000-493: Was deployed to interconnect 16 nodes. The routers on the upgraded backbone were IBM RS/6000 servers running AIX UNIX. Core nodes were located at MCI facilities with end nodes at the connected regional networks and supercomputing centers. Completed in November 1991, the transition from T-1 to T-3 did not go as smoothly as the previous transition from 56 kbit/s DDS to 1.5 mbit/s T-1, as it took longer than planned. As
17136-464: Was deployed. The RADIUS server was developed by Livingston Enterprises . The NASs supported dial-in access separate from the Merit PCPs and SCPs. In 1993 Merit started what would become an eight-year phase out of its aging PCP and SCP technology. By 1998 the only PCPs still in service were supporting Wayne State University's MTS mainframe host. During their remarkably long twenty-year life cycle
17272-523: Was exchanged at four Network Access Points or NAPs. Competitively established, and initially funded by NSF, the NAPs were located in New York (actually New Jersey), Washington, D.C., Chicago, and San Jose and run by Sprint , MFS Datanet, Ameritech , and Pacific Bell . The NAPs were the forerunners of modern Internet exchange points . The NSFNET regional backbone networks could connect to any of their newer peer commercial backbone networks or directly to
17408-505: Was formed in the fall of 1966 by Michigan State University (MSU), University of Michigan (U-M), and Wayne State University (WSU). More often known as the Merit Computer Network or simply Merit, it was created to design and implement a computer network connecting the mainframe computers at the universities. In the fall of 1969, after funding for the initial development of the network had been secured, Bertram Herzog
17544-571: Was involved in a number of projects in cooperation with organizations throughout Michigan, including: In 1994, as the NSFNET project was drawing to a close, Merit organized the meetings for the North American Network Operators' Group (NANOG). NANOG evolved from the NSFNET "Regional-Techs" meetings, where technical staff from the regional networks met to discuss operational issues of common concern with each other and with
17680-676: Was named ANSNet and provided the physical infrastructure used by Merit to deliver the NSFNET Backbone Service. On April 30, 1995, the NSFNET project came to an end, when the NSFNET backbone service was decommissioned and replaced by a new Internet architecture with commercial ISPs interconnected at Network Access Points provided by multiple providers across the country. During the 1980s, Merit Network grew to serve eight member universities, with Oakland University joining in 1985 and Central Michigan University , Eastern Michigan University , and Michigan Technological University joining in 1987. In 1990, Merit's board of directors formally changed
17816-616: Was named director for MERIT. Eric Aupperle was hired as senior engineer, and was charged with finding hardware to make the network operational. The National Science Foundation (NSF) and the State of Michigan provided the initial funding for the network. In June 1970, the Applied Dynamics Division of Reliance Electric in Saline, Michigan was contracted to build three Communication Computers or CCs. Each would consist of
17952-425: Was primarily used by academic and educational entities, and was a transitional network bridging the era of the ARPANET and CSNET into the modern Internet of today. With its success, the "federally-funded backbone" model gave way to a vision of commercially operated networks operating together to which the users purchased access. On April 30, 1995, the NSFNET Backbone Service had been successfully transitioned to
18088-485: Was promoted by Harley Kilgore. The bills called for the creation of a centralized science agency, but differed in governance and research supported. The second attempt, in 1947, included Senator H. Alexander Smith 's bill S. 526, and Senator Elbert Thomas 's bill S. 525. The Smith bill reflected ideas of Vannevar Bush, while the Thomas bill was identical to the previous year's compromise bill (S. 1850). After amendments,
18224-496: Was the NSFNET Project Director, and Hans-Werner Braun was Co-Principal Investigator. From 1987 to 1994, Merit organized a series of "Regional-Techs" meetings, where technical staff from the regional networks met to discuss operational issues of common concern with each other and the Merit engineering staff. During this period, but separate from its support for the NSFNET backbone, NSF funded: The NSFNET became
18360-504: Was the for-profit subsidiary of the non-profit Advanced Network and Services (ANS) that had been created earlier by the NSFNET partners, Merit, IBM, and MCI. ANS CO+RE was created specifically to allow commercial traffic on ANSNet without jeopardizing its parent's non-profit status or violating any tax laws. The NSFNET Backbone Service and ANS CO+RE both used and shared the common ANSNet infrastructure. NSF agreed to allow ANS CO+RE to carry commercial traffic subject to several conditions: For
18496-486: Was ultimately rejected by President Richard Nixon. William D. McElroy instead took over as the third director of the NSF in 1969. By 1968, the NSF budget had reached nearly $ 500 million. In 1972 the NSF took over management of twelve interdisciplinary materials research laboratories from the Defense Department's Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). These university-based laboratories had taken
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