Nirvanix Chosen by Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera

Nirvanix, the premier enterprise Cloud Storage service provider, today announced that it has been chosen as the tertiary tier of storage for the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera (LROC). Developed by Malin Space Science Systems and operated by Arizona State University (ASU), LROC will acquire high-resolution images of the lunar surface, providing knowledge of polar illumination conditions, identifying potential resources and hazards, and enable safe landing site selection for future missions.

Scheduled to launch in May aboard Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), LROC will capture images of the lunar surface in both monochromatic, at 0.5 meter per pixel with the Narrow Angle Camera (NAC), and multi-spectral, at 100 meters per pixel with the Wide Angle Camera (WAC). The resulting images will be transmitted from the satellite to ASU for systematic processing, replicated to secondary high-performance storage in a separate building at ASU and then replicated to the Nirvanix Storage Delivery Network (SDN). Nirvanix provides a method for storing a tertiary copy of the data offsite by installing CloudNAS and writing a copy directly from the data-receiving servers.

“We were originally looking to implement a tape-based solution for the offsite component of our project but changed the specification to include Nirvanix as the third copy when we realized the benefits we’d gain,” said Dan Stanzione, Director – Fulton School High Performance Computing, Arizona State University. “By not needing to worry about tape, we’ve eliminated management issues such as monitoring hardware, swapping tapes, and having to hire a service to pick them up and store them at an offsite location. With Nirvanix, we are reassured that our tertiary copy is now online and accessible within seconds.”

“Being chosen by Arizona State to power the long-term retention of images from the LROC project is a significant win for Nirvanix and for Cloud Storage,” said Jim Zierick, Nirvanix President and CEO. “While tape historically has been chosen for this class of storage because of affordability, accessibility has always been a significant ‘pain point.’ With the Nirvanix Storage Delivery Network organizations no longer have to struggle with the reliability and data availability challenges of tape storage. As an added benefit they gain unlimited scalability of offsite storage and simplified storage management, all at a lower TCO than tape.”

Nirvanix CloudNAS is a fast, secure and easy way to gain access to the benefits of Cloud Storage. As the world’s first software-only NAS solution accessible via CIFS or NFS, CloudNAS offers enhanced secure data transfers to any of Nirvanix’s globally distributed storage nodes using integrated AES 256-bit encryption and SSL options. Through the Nirvanix CloudNAS, organizations have access to unlimited storage via the Nirvanix Storage Delivery Network (SDN) with the ability to turn any server on their network into a gateway to the Cloud accessible by many existing applications and processes.

About The Storage Delivery Network
Nirvanix has built a global cluster of storage nodes collectively referred to as the Storage Delivery Network (SDN), powered by the Nirvanix Internet Media File System (IMFS). The SDN intelligently stores, delivers and processes storage requests in the best network location, providing the best user experience in the marketplace. With the ability to store multiple file copies in multiple geographic nodes, the SDN enables unparalleled data availability for developers, businesses and enterprises.

By using the Nirvanix SDN versus alternatives such as adding network storage systems or using first generation online storage platforms, businesses benefit from better flexibility and control for their operations.