Integration of computing resources of JINR and partner countries discussed within GRID’2025 Within the 11th International Conference “Distributed Computing and Grid Technologies in Science and Education” (GRID’2025), a meeting of experts on the establishment and development of scientific communication channels between JINR and partner organizations in China, Mexico, Russia, and South Africa took place at the Meshcheryakov Laboratory of Information Technologies. The focus of the meeting was the discussion of ways to organize network communication channels of organizations of the JINR Member States and partners in order to integrate them into a unified infrastructure. This is vital for the joint employment of computing resources and scientific experiments’ data processing in light of mutual interest in the joint implementation of scientific programs in such research projects as NICA, JUNO, and the CEPC (Circular Electron Positron Collider) project currently being discussed. “We have the Tier1 site for the JUNO experiment. The Chinese side has also expressed great interest in the fact that, in the event of a positive decision on the full-scale start of the CEPC project, a Tier1 center for this experiment would be created at JINR. We, in turn, would like to see a data center of this level for the experiments at the NICA accelerator complex appear in China. This is not only about integrating computing resources. It is also an opportunity for physicists from these countries to gain access to experimental information directly in their region. By analogy, we would like to establish cooperation with Mexico and South Africa,” MLIT Director Sergei Shmatov commented on the results of the meeting. The participants of the meeting discussed the construction of alternative 100 Gb/s high-speed communication channels to ensure scientific research, the need for which arose due to circumstances caused by the difficult political situation in the world. Possibilities for the Joint Institute to resume its use of GEANT (Gigabit European Academic Network) channels were also considered. At the meeting, it was highlighted that despite the fact that many scientific centers had created powerful computer data centers, it was impossible to establish effective research work without integrating the network infrastructure. Particular attention was paid to the creation of two 100 Gb/s dedicated lines between Russia and China in partnership with JINR and the Retn network operator. This task is of strategic importance in light of the development of JINR-China cooperation, the participation of Chinese scientists in projects in the Russian Federation, and the possibility of launching the CEPC megascience project in China. Due to considerable resources required to solve this task, the need to build strong motivation at the level of the Russian and Chinese governments was underlined. The meeting was attended by MLIT Director Sergei Shmatov, MLIT Scientific Leader Vladimir Korenkov, MLIT Chief Engineer Andrey Dolbilov, SPD Software Coordinator, MLIT Senior Researcher Danila Oleynik and SPD Deputy Software Coordinator, MLIT Senior Researcher Artem Petrosyan, MLIT 1st Category Software Engineer Nikita Balashov, MLIT 1st Category Software Engineer Anton Balandin, JINR Deputy Chief Scientific Secretary Alexey Zhemchugov who is responsible for cooperation with China, Xiaomei Zhang (Institute of High Energy Physics - IHEP, China), Luciano Diaz (National Autonomous University of Mexico - UNAM), Andrey Kiryanov (Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute, NRC KI, Russia), Thabang Eric Mokoena (National Research Foundation - NRF, iThemba LABS, South Africa).
