Collaborative Research: Resource Allocation for Time-Critical Communications in Wireless Networks

无线网络的时间关键实例，如车辆网络、机器人系统、实时监视和网络控制，对分组传输有严格的截止日期要求。这些新兴的网络需要在不可靠的时变无线媒体上进行可靠和可预测的传输，以支持警告信息、语音通话和视频流等应用。尽管在过去的二十年中，无线网络在设计最大吞吐量和低延迟方面取得了显著进展，但无线网络中具有硬期限的通信仍然是一个具有挑战性的开放性问题。现有的无线网络延迟性能研究大多侧重于降低平均延迟，而不是保证硬截止日期。该项目的目标是为时间关键型应用的无线网络中具有硬截止日期的数据包传输开发基本理论和分布式算法。该项目的技术进步将有助于改进时间关键型通信的无线系统，包括所谓的物联网、网络物理系统、应急响应无线网络和传感器网络。在自组织无线网络中支持具有硬截止日期的通信问题是非常具有挑战性的，因为网络的容量区域是依赖于到达的，并且数据包截止日期会引起特殊类型的空间和时间相关性。本项目重点研究无线网络中时间关键通信的综合资源分配解决方案，利用以下四种新技术：(1)虚拟链路方法实现时空资源分配，以保证端到端硬截止日期；(2)截止日期感知随机访问算法；(3)虚拟帧方法处理数据包之间的无限时间相关性；(4)截止日期感知PHY/MAC资源分配。通过利用这些变革性的技术方法，该项目将(1)为关键任务无线网络设计分布式算法；(2)设计资源分配算法，以支持碰撞模型之外物理层模型的硬端到端截止日期；(3)为具有端到端截止日期约束的多跳流量设计联合路由/调度算法。教育是这个项目的核心组成部分。在这个项目的过程中，研究和教育将被整合，包括在这个项目中开发的新理论和算法到研究生水平的课程。我们将尽一切努力让本科生和弱势学生参与到这个项目中来。

Time-critical instantiations of wireless networks such as vehicular networks, robotic systems, real-time surveillance, and networked control require stringent deadline requirements on packet transmissions. These emerging networks demand reliable and predictable transmissions over an unreliable, time-varying wireless medium to support applications such as warning messages, voice calls and video streaming. Despite remarkable progress in the design of wireless networks with maximum throughput and low delays over the last two decades, communications with hard deadlines in wireless networks remains a challenging open problem. Most existing works on delay performance in wireless networks focus on reducing average delays rather than guaranteeing hard deadlines. The goal of this project is to develop fundamental theories and distributed algorithms for transmitting packets with hard deadlines in wireless networks for time-critical applications. Technical advances in this project will contribute to the improvement of wireless systems for time-critical communications, including the so-called internet of things, cyber-physical systems, emergency response wireless networks, and sensor networks.The problem of supporting communications with hard deadlines in ad hoc wireless networks is very challenging because the capacity region of the network is arrival-dependent, and packet deadlines induce special types of spatial and temporal correlation. This project focuses on a comprehensive resource allocation solution for time-critical communications in wireless networks by utilizing the following four novel techniques: (1) a virtual link approach to achieve spatial-temporal resource allocation to guarantee end-to-end hard deadlines, (2) a deadline-aware random access algorithm, (3) a virtual frame approach to deal with the infinite temporal correlation among packets, and (4) deadline-aware PHY/MAC resource allocation. By exploiting these transformative technical approaches, the project will (1) design distributed algorithms for mission-critical wireless networks, (2) design resource allocation algorithms for supporting hard end-to-end deadlines for physical layer models beyond the collision model and (3) design joint routing/scheduling algorithms for multihop traffic flows with end-to-end deadline constraints. Education is a core component of this project. During the course of this project, research and education will be integrated by including new theories and algorithms developed in this project into graduate-level courses. Every effort will be made to involve undergraduates and students from under-represented students in this project.