Configurable protocol design and optimization for ubiquitous networks

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We have witnessed the explosive growth of the Internet, which becomes a ubiquitous information transport infrastructure with hybrid wired and wireless links. However, the current network protocols encounter fundamental challenges from both new applications and emerging communication technologies. For example, many media-rich applications such as Internet Protocol Television have stringent quality of service (QoS) requirements and are very demanding in network resources; future vehicular networks need to deliver emergency messages which are both time and location critical; underwater, underground, and deep-space networks rely on communication channels significantly different from the terrestrial ones. We propose to develop network protocols that can be flexibly configured to support heterogeneous applications over hybrid networks with emerging communication technologies. Specifically, we will develop a) physical layer technologies configurable by software to support differentiated services; b) medium access control and routing protocols that adapt to changing network environments and applications; and c) transport layer protocols with configurable control parameters. The innovation and expected contributions of the proposed research lie in three aspects. First, without abandoning the layered network architecture, the proposed configurable protocols can be scalable, robust, and incrementally deployed. Second, with the inherent adaptiveness of the proposed configurable protocols, we can optimize protocol parameters to not only improve system performance, but also enable new services that are not possible with the traditional protocols. Third, the work on a configurable physical layer supporting service differentiation will shed new light on traditional information theory. The proposed protocols will be implemented and tested in the wireless testbed with software defined radio peripherals. The success of our research will contribute to ubiquitous network services that will underpin advances and reforms in many industry sectors such as commerce, manufacturing, education, health care, and facilitate weather forecasting, natural resource exploration, disaster warning, and environment safeguarding.