GARR (http://www.garr.it) is the first National Research Network in Europe to be connected at 10Gbit/sec to GÉANT (http://www.geant.net), replicating the event of July 1989, when GARR was the first European network to be connected over an international link at 2Mbit/sec between Bologna and Geneva. GÉANT enables European scientists to compete internationally by providing them with a world-class backbone that offers the bandwidth and the quality of service required for research and development activities at this level. It represents the basis for the introduction of 'virtual laboratories' and 'virtual institutes' in Europe. This will be extremely beneficial for the Italian research community participating in international projects in many domains. The services provided by GÉANT, will also allow the implementation of a powerful network research infrastructure to support GRID applications.