Visapult is a prototype application and framework for remote visualization of
large scientific datasets. We approach the technical challenges of tera-scale
visualization with a unique architecture that employs high speed WANs and
network data caches for data staging and transmission. This architecture allows
for the use of available cache and compute resources at arbitrary locations on
the network. High data throughput rates and network utilization are achieved by
parallelizing I/O at each stage in the application, and by pipelining the
visualization process. On the desktop, the graphics interactivity is
effectively decoupled from the latency inherent in network applications. We
present a detailed performance analysis of the application, and improvements
resulting from field-test analysis conducted as part of the DOE Combustion
Corridor project.