Thursday, August 23, 2012

Ian F. Akyildiz

Broadband Wireless Networking Lab School of Electrical and Computer Engineering Georgia Institute of Technology, USA

N3Cat (NaNoNetworking Center in Catalunya) School of Electrical Engineering Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya Barcelona , Catalunya, Spain

"Nanonetworks: A New Frontier in Communications"

[Presentation Slides]

Nanotechnology is enabling the development of devices in a scale ranging from one to a few one hundred nanometers. Nanonetworks, i.e., the interconnection of nano-scale devices, are expected to expand the capabilities of single nano-machines by allowing them to cooperate and share information. Traditional communication technologies are not directly suitable for nanonetworks mainly due to the size and power consumption of existing transmitters, receivers and additional processing components. All these define a new communication paradigm that demands novel solutions such as nano-transceivers, channel models for the nano-scale, and protocols and architectures for nanonetworks. In this talk, first the state-of-the-art in nano-machines, including architectural aspects, expected features of future nano-machines, and current developments are presented for a better understanding of the nanonetwork scenarios. Moreover, nanonetworks features and components are explained and compared with traditional communication networks. Novel nano-antennas based on nano-materials as well as the terahertz band are investigated for electromagnetic communication in nanonetworks. Furthermore, molecular communication mechanisms are presented for short-range networking based on ion signaling and molecular motors, for medium-range networking based on flagellated bacteria and nanorods, as well as for long-range networking based on pheromones and capillaries. Finally, open research challenges such as the development of network components, molecular communication theory, and new architectures and protocols, which need to be solved in order to pave the way for the development and deployment of nanonetworks within the next couple of decades are presented.

Biography:
Ian F. Akyildiz received his BS, MS, and PhD degrees in Computer Engineering from the University of Erlangen-Nuernberg, Germany, in 1978, 1981 and 1984, respectively. Currently, he is the Ken Byers Distinguished Chair Professor with the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Director of the Broadband Wireless Networking Laboratory and Chair of the Telecommunications Group at Georgia Tech. Dr. Akyildiz is an Honorary Professor with School of Electrical Engineering at the Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya, and Director of N3Cat (NaNoNetworking Center in Catalunya) in Barcelona, Spain, since June 2008.

He is the Editor-in-Chief of Computer Networks (Elsevier) Journal since 2000, the founding Editor-in-Chief of the Ad Hoc Networks Journal (Elsevier) in 2003, the founding Editor-in-Chief of the Physical Communication (PHYCOM) Journal (Elsevier) in 2008, and the founding Editor-in-Chief of the Nano Communication Networks (NANOCOMNET) Journal (Elsevier) in 2010.

Dr. Akyildiz is an IEEE FELLOW (1996) and an ACM FELLOW (1997). Dr. Akyildiz received the 1997 IEEE Leonard G. Abraham Prize award (IEEE Communications Society) for his paper entitled "Multimedia Group Synchronization Protocols for Integrated Services Architectures" published in the IEEE Journal of Selected Areas in Communications (JSAC) in January 1996. Dr. Akyildiz received the 2003 Best Tutorial Paper Award (IEEE Communications Society) for his paper entitled "A Survey on Sensor Networks" published in the IEEE Communications Magazine, August 2002. Dr. Akyildiz received the Best Paper Award for "Interferer Classification, Channel Selection and Transmission Adaptation for Wireless Sensor Networks" in the Ad Hoc and Sensor Networks (AHSN) symposium at IEEE ICC, June 2009.

He received the "Don Federico Santa Maria Medal" for his services to the Universidad of Federico Santa Maria in Chile in 1986. He served as a National Lecturer for ACM from 1989 until 1998 and received the ACM Outstanding Distinguished Lecturer Award for 1994. Dr. Akyildiz received the 2002 IEEE Harry M. Goode Memorial award (IEEE Computer Society) with the citation "for significant and pioneering contributions to advanced architectures and protocols for wireless and satellite networking". He also received the 2003 ACM SIGMOBILE Outstanding Contribution Award for his "pioneering contributions in the area of mobility and resource management for wireless communication networks", September 2003.

Dr. Akyildiz received the 2004 Georgia Tech Faculty Research Author Award for his "outstanding record of publications of papers between 1999-2003", April 2004. He also received the 2005 Distinguished Faculty Achievement Award from School of ECE, Georgia Tech, April 2005. Dr. Akyildiz received the Georgia Tech Outstanding Doctoral Thesis Advisor Award for his 20+ years service and dedication to Georgia Tech and producing outstanding PhD students. He also received the 2009 ECE Distinguished Mentor Award by the Georgia Tech School of Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Honors Committee.

Dr. Akyildiz received the Best Paper Award for "Interferer Classification, Channel Selection and Transmission Adaptation for Wireless Sensor Networks" in the Ad Hoc and Sensor Networks (AHSN) symposium at IEEE ICC, in June 2009. He also received the Best Paper Award for "Deployment Algorithms for Wireless Underground Sensor Networks using Magnetic Induction" in the IEEE Global Communications Conference (Globecom), in December 2010.

Dr. Akyildiz received the 2010 IEEE Communications Society Ad Hoc and Sensor Networks Technical Committee (AHSN TC) Technical Recognition Award with the citation: "For pioneering contributions to wireless sensor networks and wireless mesh networks", in December 2010.

Dr. Akyildiz received the 2011 IEEE Computer Society W. Wallace McDowell Award for pioneering contributions to wireless sensor network architectures and communication protocols, in May 2011.

Dr. Akyildiz received the 2011 TUBITAK (Turkish National Science Foundation) Exclusive Award for outstanding contributions to the advancement of scholarship/research at international level.

Dr. Akyildiz is the author of an advanced textbook on "Wireless Sensor Networks" published by John Wiley and Sons in June 2010. Dr. Akyildiz is the author of an advanced textbook on "Wireless Mesh Networks" published by John Wiley and Sons in February 2009.

Dr. Akyildiz serves on the advisory boards of several research centers, journals, high tech companies, conferences and publication companies. His current research interests are in Nanonetworks, Cognitive Radio Networks and Wireless Sensor Networks.

Friday, August 24, 2012

P. R. Kumar

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Texas A&M University, USA

"Three Theories for Delays, Clocks and Security in Wireless Networks"

We propose three theories, which can be regarded as attempts to characterize and establish guaranteed properties of wireless networks:

(i) How and to what extent can we deliver packets with hard delay bounds?

(ii) How and to what extent can we synchronize clocks in wireless networks?

(iii) Can we develop provably secure protocols for the entire life-cycle of wireless networks that also optimize a utility measure while operating in a hostile environment?

For the first problem, consider an access point serving several clients over unreliable wireless links. Suppose packets arrive for/from the clients, with each packet having a hard deadline, after which it is dropped. We characterize precisely the mix of delivery ratios, channel unreliabilities and hard deadline that the access point can guarantee, under some models.

For the second problem, consider a wireless network where clocks at the nodes are linear, though with different rates (skews) and offsets. Nodes can exchange packets with their neighbors, with direction dependent delays. We characterize precisely to what extent clocks can and cannot be synchronized and delays determined. Under a random model the end-to-end error can be kept bounded irrespective of network size.

Concerning the third problem, traditionally, wireless protocols have been developed to provide performance. As attacks are identified, the protocols are fortified against the identified vulnerabilities. However, holistic guarantees are not provided against other attacks. We seek to reverse this paradigm. We propose a provable approach that guarantees the protocol suite is secure when the nodes are subject to certain assumptions. The protocols take a set of good nodes mingled with unknown malicious nodes from primordial birth to an operating network, while attaining min-max of a utility function. The maximization is over protocols announced and followed by the good nodes, and the minimization is over all behaviors of the malicious nodes. Further, the malicious nodes are reduced to either cooperating or jamming [Joint work with Vivek Borkar, Nikolaos Freris, Scott Graham, I-Hong Hou, Yih-Chun Hu, Jonathan Ponniah and Roberto Solis].

Biography:
P. R. Kumar obtained his B. Tech. in Electrical Engineering (Electronics) from I.I.T. Madras in 1973, and D.Sc. in Systems Science and Mathematics from Washington University, St. Louis in 1977. From 1977-84 he was in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Maryland Baltimore County, and from 1985-2011 he was in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and the Coordinated Science Laboratory, at the University of Illinois. Currently he is at Texas A&M University, where he holds the College of Engineering Chair in Computer Engineering. Kumar has worked on problems in game theory, adaptive control, stochastic systems, simulated annealing, neural networks, machine learning, queueing networks, manufacturing systems, scheduling, wafer fabrication plants, information theory, wireless networks, sensor networks, and cyberphysical systems. He received the Donald P. Eckman Award of the American Automatic Control Council, the Fred W. Ellersick Prize of the IEEE Communications Society, and the IEEE Field Award for Control Systems. He was a Guest Chair Professor and Leader of the Guest Chair Professor Group on Wireless Communication and Networking at Tsinghua University, Beijing, and is an Honorary Professor at IIT Hyderabad. He is a Fellow of IEEE, the Academy of Sciences of the Developing World, and a member of the National Academy of Engineering, USA. He received the Distinguished Alumnus Award from IIT Madras, the Alumni Achievement Award from Washington University in St. Louis, and the Daniel C. Drucker Eminent Faculty Award from the College of Engineering, University of Illinois. He was awarded an honorary doctorate by ETH, Zurich.