The Science of Network Coding

网络编码是在千年之交提出的一个优雅而强大的概念，预计将成为未来通信网络的核心技术，彻底改变地理上分散的地点之间的信息通信方式。网络编码的基本好处体现在网络容量、纠错、能量效率、网络安全性、存储效率、传输延迟和算法复杂性。虽然大多数现有的网络编码理论研究都是基于信息论和代数方法，但网络编码科学是一项旨在改变人们对网络编码的思考方式的研究计划，在这个简单而基本的工具上邀请新的观点，从而产生关于该主题的新的基本见解以及更容易和更有效的实践应用。正如其名称所示，网络编码是在网络中执行的编码，并且自然受益于计算机科学和数学处理，其探索了底层网络拓扑结构以及相关算法，复杂性和可扩展性问题。网络编码科学填补了现有网络编码理论研究的空白，与信息论和代数方法相互补充和竞争。** 网络编码科学的成功将为互联网、无线网络和分布式存储系统中的应用提供高效和有效的网络编码算法，构成一种关键平台技术，进一步服务于从信息通信中受益的高级应用，如云计算、大数据分析、智能电网、生物信息学和环境监测。网络编码可以在依赖信息交流并从中受益的系统之间实现高效、可靠和安全的信息收集和传播。

Network coding, an elegant and powerful concept introduced at the turn of the millennium, is expected to be a core enabling technology in future communication networks, revolutionizing the way information are communicated across geographically dispersed locations. Fundamental benefits of network coding arise in network capacity, error correction, energy efficiency, network security, storage efficiency, transmission delays, and algorithm complexity. While most existing studies in network coding theory are based on information theory and algebraic approaches, The Science of Network Coding is a research program that aspires to change the way people think about network coding, inviting new view points on this simple yet fundamental tool, resulting in new fundamental insights on the subject as well as easier and more effective applications in practice. As evident in its name, network coding is coding performed within a network, and naturally benefits from a computer science and mathematics treatment that explores the underlying network topology, and the associated algorithms, complexity and achievability issues. The Science of Network Coding fills such a gap in existing studies on network coding theory, complementing and competing with the information theory and algebraic approaches. **Successes in the science of network coding will enable efficient and effective network coding algorithms for applications in the Internet, in wireless networks, and in distributed storage systems, constituting a key platform technology that further serves high-level applications that benefit from the communication of information, such as cloud computing, big data analytics, smart grids, bioinformatics, and environmental monitoring. Network coding can lead to efficient, robust and secure information gleaning and dissemination among such systems that depend upon and benefit from the exchange of information.