data centers

George Mason showcases data center research leadership to Japanese delegation

tdonnel — Tue, 15 Sep 2026 19:39:52 +0000

George Mason showcases data center research leadership to Japanese delegation tdonnel Tue, 09/15/2026 - 15:39

As part of an international mission focused on data center technology, infrastructure, and supply chain opportunities in Virginia, 91�� welcomed a delegation of nearly 50 Japanese business leaders to Mason Square in Arlington. The visit was organized by the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO) in collaboration with the Virginia Economic Development Partnership, and the Northern Virginia Economic Development Alliance.

The delegation, which included representatives from 40 companies and nine JETRO staff members, spent the morning exploring Northern Virginia's renowned "Data Center Alley" in Loudoun County, the world's largest concentration of data centers and a critical hub for global internet traffic. The tour highlighted the infrastructure, power systems, and connectivity that established Northern Virginia as a leading center for digital infrastructure investment.

JETRO delegation at 91�� Mason Square. Photo provided.

In the afternoon, the group visited the Mason Square, where Liling Huang, associate professor and director of energy-related research initiatives, led tours of the university's advanced research facilities. During the visit, attendees explored the E2 Center, which features education and simulation capabilities related to small modular reactors, and the Smart Grid and Renewable Energy Lab, where researchers are advancing work in power systems, grid modernization, energy protection, and renewable technologies.

Delegates also received an overview of George Mason's developing AI Data Center Research Lab and its focus on next-generation power infrastructure and energy systems for artificial intelligence applications.

“Virginia’s leadership in data centers creates a unique opportunity and responsibility to shape the future of digital infrastructure,” said Huang. “By connecting George Mason’s expertise in power, energy, and AI data centers with Japan’s technology and industry leadership, we can accelerate innovation, develop the workforce, and build more resilient and sustainable infrastructure for the AI era.”

The tours showcased how George Mason is helping address one of the industry's most pressing challenges: developing the workforce, technologies, and energy solutions needed to support rapid growth in data center capacity. The demonstrations highlighted opportunities for research collaboration and talent development at a time when demand for reliable power and computing resources continues to accelerate worldwide.

Huang (left) and graduate students (center, right) led tours at Mason Square. Photo provided.

Following the tours, George Mason hosted an industry panel that brought together leaders from Virginia's data center and electrical infrastructure ecosystem to share perspectives on market growth, facility development, power requirements, engineering, construction, and technology integration. The panel also explored opportunities for Japanese companies to contribute expertise and innovation to Virginia's expanding digital infrastructure sector.

“Having toured data centers in Japan while I worked for NTT, it was pretty clear to me that the Japanese infrastructure and service suppliers have many innovations to share with the U.S. market,” said Phillip Sandino, a senior vice president and head of utility development with Tract. “The Japanese have dealt with land constraints that have driven innovation in density and multi-story construction, which can help U.S. companies make the most of entitled land that we currently have.”

“Engaging with the Japanese business delegation was a powerful reminder that technical collaboration is more than the exchange of ideas. It is the foundation for innovation, operational excellence, and long-term strategic partnership,” said Jim Stage, a strategic advisor for Dominion Energy. “I meet with people of various business backgrounds and scheduled several meets based on the information that we shared.”

The program concluded with an industry exchange session, where members of the delegation presented challenges and emerging needs facing their companies. The interactive discussion gave industry representatives, faculty, and guests the opportunity to identify areas for collaboration and explore solutions to evolving technology and infrastructure demands.

JETRO visit panelists. From left to right: Barker, Kevin Hatcher, Sandino, Stage, and Wernli. Photo provided.

“The JETRO delegation visit was a great opportunity to connect with leaders from Japan's energy, technology, and infrastructure sectors and talk about the growing power and infrastructure demands of the data center market,” said Michael Barker, operations manager at Hensel Phelps. “The reverse-pitch session was especially valuable because it allowed us to hear directly from the Japanese companies about the solutions they're developing and how some of those ideas could potentially be applied here in the U.S., and I'd like to thank Dr. Liling Huang and 91�� for bringing together the Japanese delegation and Virginia industry leaders for a truly worthwhile exchange.”

“It was exciting to hear about the technologies and solutions being developed to address some of the most pressing issues for data center and electrical infrastructure development. The reverse pitches highlighted innovative approaches to sound mitigation, infrastructure monitoring, and site development, along with emerging technologies that could help future projects operate more sustainably while remaining good neighbors within their communities,” said David Wernli, a project manager at Dewberry.

The event constituted JETRO's largest delegation visit to Virginia to date. Organizers reported many attendees were visiting Virginia for the first time and were particularly impressed by the region's hospitality, industry expertise, and innovation ecosystem. The visitors highlighted the value of both the industry panel discussions and the tour of George Mason's research assets.

The visit underscored 91��'s expertise in power and data center research, workforce development, and industry engagement, while strengthening connections between Virginia's innovation ecosystem and leading companies from Japan's technology and energy sectors.

In This Story

Liling Huang

Learn more about the College of Engineering and Computing

Topics

data centers

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

Campus News

Energy

College of Engineering and Computing

Designing deeper data center defense

Nathan Kahl — Fri, 04 Sep 2026 01:25:30 +0000

Designing deeper data center defense Nathan Kahl Thu, 09/03/2026 - 21:25

In This Story

Kai Zeng

Liling Huang

As artificial intelligence (AI) drives rapid growth in data centers, the facilities powering the technology are becoming more complex, more valuable, and potentially more vulnerable to cyberattacks. Two 91�� researchers want to help close security gaps before attackers can exploit them.

Liling Huang. Photo by Ron Aira/Office of University Branding

Kai Zeng and Liling Huang, a professor and associate professor, respectively, in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, are developing new approaches to protect AI data centers from threats ranging from insiders stealing valuable AI models to cyberattacks against the systems controlling a facility’s power and cooling.

Zeng and Huang received $100,000 from the Virginia Innovation Partnership Authority through the Commonwealth Cyber Initiative Northern Virginia Node for “Defense-in-Depth Cyber-Physical Security for AI Data Centers.” The one-year project examines vulnerabilities that traditional cybersecurity approaches may not fully address, including the increasingly complicated intersection of information technology, operational technology, and building-management systems.

“It’s a very urgent and emerging topic,” Zeng said. “Just look at how many new AI data centers are built every year, every month.” The issue has particular resonance in Virginia, which has the world’s largest concentration of data center infrastructure and is rapidly becoming a hub for large-scale AI computing.

AI data centers present new challenges because the systems differ from conventional data centers, Huang said. Operators in traditional facilities have years of experience understanding normal activity, making anomalies easy to identify. With AI infrastructure, that baseline is still developing.

“With AI data centers, we are still learning about their operational behavior and how it affects both behind-the-meter electrical systems and the broader power grid,” Huang said. “This uncertainty makes cybersecurity more challenging because, when abnormal behavior occurs, it can be difficult to distinguish a cyberattack from a legitimate equipment or power-system issue.”

The researchers will investigate three areas. One is communication among the clusters of graphics processing units (GPUs) used for AI computing. Their extremely fast connections can make monitoring activity difficult. “It’s harder to monitor the traffic exchange there between the GPUs, which could be a kind of blind spot from a security perspective,” Zeng said.

Another focus is protecting what’s known as “checkpoints,” snapshots of an AI model’s state created during training. Training a large AI model can take weeks. At intervals, the system saves the model's current state, including what it has learned so far. That saved state is the checkpoint, which can contain valuable intellectual property, making them potential targets for tampering or insider attacks. The researchers plan to explore whether data collected from systems throughout the data center, known as telemetry, can help verify that a checkpoint is authentic.

Kai Zeng. Photo by Office of University Branding

The third area involves the boundary between IT systems and operational technology, including systems controlling power and cooling. “Someone does not necessarily have to directly hack into the server, because they can just disrupt the building management system,” Zeng said.

The project benefits from the researchers’ complementary expertise. Huang explained that cybersecurity practices have traditionally been more mature in information technology systems, while operational technology has emphasized reliability, safety, availability, and engineering performance. Zeng brings cybersecurity expertise, while Huang contributes expertise in AI data centers, electrical and mechanical systems, and the power grid. Together, they will work to strengthen cybersecurity protections for the operational technology systems of AI data centers.

The team plans to produce a data center threat model, prototype security technologies, experimental results, and at least one peer-reviewed publication. The seed project is also intended to position the researchers for larger federal and industry-funded projects.

Zeng hopes the initial investment can provide the foundation for something considerably larger. “We can apply later to turn this $100,000 project into, potentially, $1 million,” he said. “Start small, but scale up, and scale big.”

Topics

Cyber Security

Commonwealth Cyber Initiative (CCI)

Electrical and Computer Engineering

Artificial Intelligence

Research

College of Engineering and Computing

data centers

data centers

George Mason showcases data center research leadership to Japanese delegation

In This Story

Related Stories

Topics

Designing deeper data center defense

In This Story

Topics