CAREER: Optimization and Design of Next-Generation Cognitive Mesh Networks: From Theory to Practice

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This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5). Cognitive radios and multi-antenna systems are two recent components that each offers a great potential for improving spectrum efficiency. The former enables opportunistic spectrum access (OSA), while the latter enables multiple-input, multiple-output (MIMO) capability. This project develops theoretical and practical frameworks for wireless mesh networks when they are both MIMO-enabled and OSA-capable. The objective of this research is three-fold. First, it takes a bottom-up, cross-layer approach to understand, model, and characterize the optimal end-to-end network throughput while accounting for physical-layer limitations and link-layer contention constraints. Second, the project develops efficient networking algorithms by investigating new paradigms that shift away from traditional ones to suit these OSA-capable, MIMO-enabled networks. Third, this project implements the thus-developed techniques in a real, experimental wireless mesh network that is built from off-the-shelf commercial components. This demonstrates both the feasibility and the effectiveness of the developed concepts.This project provides scientific solutions to the spectrum scarcity problem. The results are disseminated via publications, software releases, and seminars. It involves undergraduate students in research activities during their class and independent study projects; (ii) creates the opportunity for K-12 and minority students to work on real-life problems and excites them to pursue engineering careers, and enriches teaching and learning curricula by integration into new course development.