Connecting Grids Using Communication Satellites

Abstract

Grid computing is viewed as a strong alternative to traditional supercomputers and mainframes. Grid computing is expanding its horizon to replace the current Internet as well as to address issues related to data sharing, collaboration, security, economics, and so forth. We treat a grid as a single global computer for a given community connecting all types of resources. Most of the current grid research is based on high-speed terrestrial networks. Emerging communications satellites are not restricting their applications only to telecommunication, but also aim to provide an alternative to terrestrial links in computing fields. This paper describes the supplementary features of both technologies and explores the possibility of handshaking between the two. It also presents the architecture and discusses possible experiments leading to live applications.