More than 64 petabytes of scientific data moved to the CERN Tape Archive, a first step towards the HL-LHC era.
On September 15th, PIC successfully migrated its tape storage system from Enstore to CTA (CERN Tape Archive). The operation involved more than 64 petabytes of data belonging to 18 different scientific groups.
PIC has relied on Enstore since 2007, when it established a collaboration agreement with Fermilab (FNAL) to evolve the software into a site-independent tool. Over nearly two decades, Enstore has served PIC very successfully, as a core service of the Tier-1 centre for the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) through to the end of Run-3, and safeguarding the data of the many research communities that rely on the centre for long-term preservation and massive processing.
The move to CTA brings clear benefits. The new system delivers a significant performance boost, with data access speeds significantly faster as before, especially for writes. It also offers a more sustainable long-term future, backed by a community of physics-related data centres that are partnering with CERN on its joint evolution.
The deployment of CTA is one of the first steps in preparing PIC’s infrastructure for its next major performance challenge: the High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC), which will generate data volumes far beyond what we have seen so far. With this milestone, PIC reinforces its commitment to providing reliable, high-performance mass storage for the scientific projects it supports.