AS10965 MRNET

MRNET is MRnet, Manitoba's regional advanced research and education network, based in Winnipeg. RIS reports 3 announced IPv4 prefixes covering 768 addresses, no IPv6, and 5 observed neighbours. Sampled reverse DNS resolves under mrnet.mb.ca, including brandon.mrnet.mb.ca.

What it's used for

MRnet is a not-for-profit that connects Manitoba's post-secondary institutions and research organisations to each other and to Canada's national research network, in the same way that state and provincial R&E networks do elsewhere. Its members include the University of Manitoba, the University of Winnipeg, Brandon University, Université de Saint-Boniface, RRC Polytech and others. The brandon.mrnet.mb.ca PTR is a member-site handoff, and stats.mrnet.mb.ca is exactly what it sounds like: monitoring infrastructure for the network itself.

Notable

The address count is misleading if read as a measure of importance. An R&E aggregator holds only enough space for its own routers, monitoring and exchange infrastructure. Its member institutions announce their own campus space under their own numbers, so the traffic MRnet carries is many orders of magnitude larger than its 768 addresses would suggest. The five observed neighbours are the useful signal here: that is a regional network peering with backbones and members, not an enterprise with one uplink.

Interesting

MRnet is a founding member of CANARIE, the organisation that operates Canada's national research and education backbone, so its involvement in the country's R&E networking predates most of the provincial networks that now surround it.