How Radzen DataGrid Powers a Research Data Portal at the University of Nevada

One of the most rewarding aspects of building developer tools is hearing how they make a real difference. Today we're sharing a customer success story from Jagadish Rapuru, a .NET AI Engineer at the University of Nevada, Reno, who single-handedly designed and built the official web platform for the Great Basin Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit (GBCESU) — a 1.5-year, full-lifecycle project from initial requirements through deployment and long-term maintenance.

Live website: gbcesu.unr.edu | Developer: Jagadish Rapuru

About the GBCESUlink

The Great Basin CESU is one of seventeen units within the national Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit Network. Its mission is to provide research, technical assistance, and education to federal land management, environmental, and research agencies across the Great Basin — a vast region bounded by the Sierra Nevada, the southern plains of Idaho, the Wasatch Range, and the Mojave Desert.

The University of Nevada, Reno serves as the host institution, coordinating research activities and collaboration among partner organizations. The platform Jagadish built needed to support all of this: facilitating research for federal agencies, fostering collaboration and information sharing among partners, and providing public access to extensive datasets about natural and cultural resources.

The Challengelink

The portal needed to manage large research datasets — 5,000+ records spanning research projects, publications, expert information, spatial datasets, and institutional records — with complex search, filtering, sorting, and pagination requirements.

The initial approach relied on custom T-SQL stored procedures and backend logic for all data operations, but this quickly became difficult to maintain and scale. On top of that:

• The interface had to be responsive and intuitive for researchers, agency staff, and partners with varying technical backgrounds
• Jagadish was the sole developer on the project, working under tight deadlines with limited resources
• The platform needed to handle sensitive research and institutional data with proper authentication and role-based access control
• Every hour spent on data grid plumbing was an hour not spent on the research experience itself

The Tech Stacklink

Jagadish built the platform as a full-stack .NET application:

• Frontend: Blazor with Radzen Components and JavaScript for client-side enhancements
• Backend: .NET Core and C# with structured Web APIs for business logic and data access
• Database: SQL Server with a Database-First architecture, ensuring strong data integrity and seamless integration with existing university datasets
• Security: Authentication and authorization with role-based access control, integrated throughout the development lifecycle

Where Radzen Made the Differencelink

Within this architecture, Radzen Blazor Components became the accelerator. After evaluating options, Jagadish chose Radzen for several key reasons:

• Native Blazor Server support with seamless C#/.NET integration — no context switching away from the .NET stack
• RadzenDataGrid offered built-in server-side pagination, filtering, and sorting, eliminating the need for custom backend logic
• Professional, polished UI components that worked out-of-the-box — critical for a public-facing institutional platform
• Excellent documentation and active community support for getting unstuck fast
• Significantly faster development compared to building custom components from scratch

Jagadish used RadzenDataGrid across all data-intensive pages — research records, publications, expert directories, and spatial datasets. Key implementation details:

• Server-side data operations using IQueryable for optimal performance with large datasets
• Custom column templates for complex data rendering tailored to research workflows
• Built-in export functionality so researchers can download filtered data on the fly
• Additional Radzen components for forms, notifications, and layouts to maintain a consistent, professional look throughout the portal

The Resultslink

The impact was substantial:

• ~60% reduction in data grid development time
• 500+ lines of custom T-SQL filtering and pagination code eliminated
• Delivered ahead of schedule — a production-ready portal with a cleaner, more maintainable codebase
• Researchers and agency partners can now search and filter thousands of records instantly
• The platform has been in active production use, with ongoing maintenance, performance tuning, and feature enhancements driven by stakeholder feedback

As Jagadish reflected in his write-up of the project: designing scalable architecture from the beginning significantly reduces long-term complexity, and maintainable code consistently proves more valuable than short-term optimizations — principles that Radzen's component model naturally encourages.

"Radzen DataGrid transformed how I handle large datasets in Blazor. What would have taken weeks of custom T-SQL and backend logic was solved in days — with cleaner, more maintainable code. It's now my go-to for any data-heavy Blazor project."

— Jagadish Rapuru, .NET AI Engineer at University of Nevada, Reno

Try It Yourselflink

If you're working on data-heavy Blazor applications, RadzenDataGrid can help you move faster with less code. Check out the live demos and documentation to get started.

Not yet using Radzen? Download Radzen Blazor Studio for free and see how it can accelerate your next project.