SGER: Exploratory Research on A New Survivable, Scalable, and Self-Adapting Network Architecture Based on Biological Concepts

PI在本项目中提出的生物网络体系结构的灵感来自于这样一个观察：生物界已经开发出必要的机制，以实现下一代互联网(NGI)的可扩展性、异构性和动态性、安全性、可生存性和简单性等关键要求。在生物世界中，每个个体实体(例如，蜂群中的一只蜜蜂)遵循一组简单的行为规则(例如，迁移、繁殖、能量交换、突变和死亡)，而一组实体(例如，蜂群)表现出复杂的、紧急的行为(例如，适应、进化、安全、生存性)。因此，如果服务和应用采用生物学的概念和机制，它们也可能能够实现NGI的关键需求。研究者建议应用来自生物世界的关键概念和机制来设计、实现、并对一种名为生物网络体系结构的新网络体系结构进行经验评估。在生物网络体系结构中，服务和应用程序由称为网络实体的多个实体的集合来实现(就像一个由多个蜜蜂组成的蜂群)。这些网络实体具有与其服务或应用相关的功能，并遵循与生物实体类似的简单行为规则(例如，迁移、繁殖、能量交换、突变、死亡)。在生物网络体系结构中，当单个网络实体交互时，会产生有用的紧急行为(例如，适应、进化、安全和可生存性)。生物网络体系结构可以应用于各种NGI应用和服务，包括信息发布、数据存储、资源发现或公钥基础设施。该项目的创新主张是：提出的生物网络体系结构是首次尝试将涌现行为、自主控制、适应和进化等生物学概念应用于广泛而一般的网络服务和应用。以前对生物体系结构的研究是为了理解生物过程、模拟生命或紧急行为、分布式计算或机器人学。生物网络架构使构建满足NGI关键要求的服务和应用成为可能。之所以实现可伸缩性，是因为网络实体自主行动，并且仅使用本地信息在本地基础上行动。服务或应用的构建被简化，因为只需要设计网络实体级别的相对简单的行为。适应性、安全性和可生存性的其他要求只是作为一个整体进行交互的网络实体的紧急行为。使用生物网络体系结构设计的服务和应用程序通过其网络实体的自主操作来适应异类和动态变化的网络条件，每个网络实体都表现出简单的行为。它们还通过生物网络体系结构的突变和自然选择机制进化为更令人满意的行为。当前的网络服务必须根据网络条件进行手动配置和优化。生物网络体系结构具有可用作抵御攻击的额外防御层的功能。除了身份验证和加密等传统安全技术外，服务和应用程序还可以使用生物网络体系结构的功能，如入侵检测、自主复制、算法多样性和网络实体的分散，作为附加层。这些功能增加了服务或应用程序能够检测到内部人员、恐怖分子或国家的协同攻击并从中恢复的可能性。目前的网络服务和应用程序只有一层防御，因此它们不太可能在协同攻击中幸存下来。

The Bio-Networking Architecture that the PI proposes in this project is inspired by the observation that the biological world has already developed the mechanisms necessary to achieve such key requirements for the Next Generation Internet (NGI) as scalability, heterogeneity and dynamicity, security, survivability, and simplicity. In the biological world, each individual entity (e.g., a bee in a bee colony) follows a simple set ofbehavior rules (e.g., migration, reproduction, energy exchange, mutation, and death), yet a group of entities (e.g. a bee colony) exhibits complex, emergent behavior (e.g., adaptation, evolution, security, urvivability).Therefore, if services and applications adopt biological concepts and mechanisms, they too may be able to achieve the key requirements of NGI.The researcher proposes to apply key concepts and mechanisms from the biological world to design, implement, and empirically evaluate a new network architecture called the Bio-Networking Architecture. In the Bio-Networking Architecture, services and applications are implemented by a collection of multiple entities called cyberentities (as a bee colony consists of multiple bees). These cyberentities have functionality related to their service or application and follow simple behavior rules (e.g., migration, reproduction, energy exchange, mutation, death) similar to biological entities. In the Bio-Networking Architecture, useful emergent behaviors (e.g., adaptation, evolution, security, and survivability) result when individual cyberentities interact. The Bio-Networking Architecture can be applied to a variety ofNGI applications and services, including information dissemination, data storage, resource discovery, or public key infrastructure.The innovative claims of the proposed project are: The proposed Bio-Networking Architecture is the first attempt to apply the biological concepts of emergent behavior, autonomous control, and adaptation and evolution to a broad and general class of network services and applications. Previous studies of biological architectures were for the purpose of understanding biological processes, simulating life or emergent behavior, distributed computation, or robotics. The Bio-Networking Architecture enables the construction of services and applications which meet the key requirements of NGI. Scalability is achieved because cyberentities act autonomously, and on a local basis using only local information. Construction of the service or application is simplified because only relatively simple behaviors at the cyberentity level need to be designed. The other requirements of adaptation, security, and survivability are simply the emergent behavior of the cyberentities interacting as a whole. Services and applications designed using the Bio-Networking Architecture adapt to heterogeneous and dynamically changing network conditions through the autonomous actions of their cyberentities, each exhibiting simple behaviors. They also evolve to more desirable behaviors through the mutation and natural selection mechanisms of the Bio-Networking Architecture. Current network services must be manually configured and optimized to network conditions. The Bio-Networking Architecture has features which can be used as additional layers of defense against attacks. Services and applications can use, in addition to traditional security techniques such as authentication and encryption, features of Bio-Networking Architecture such as intrusion detection, autonomous replication, algorithmic diversity, and dispersion of the cyberentities, as additional layers. These features increase the probability that the service or application can detect, survive, and recover from coordinated attacks by insiders, terrorists, or nations. Current network services and applications have only one layer of defense, so they are unlikely to survive a coordinated attack.