Telecommunications and Network Protocols

General Research Areas

Dr. M. Junaid Arshad

Department of Computer Science & Engineering,
University of Engineering & Technology (UET), Lahore

Note:
In this file the organized given material is taken from current issues provided in
different research groups, journals, conferences and web resources. This is only
for the reference and convenience to the people involved in research activities in
different research areas of Telecommunications, Wireless and Mobile
Communication, Network Protocols, Communication Networks, Systems,
Networking and Internet.

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Chapter 1 COMMUNICATION NETWORKS

Following is the list of current main topics and their subtopics given as below:

1.1 COMMUNICATION THEORY, RELIABILITY, AND QUALITY OF SERVICE

High speed networks

1. Technologies, protocols, and applications for high speed networks

2. Voice over high speed networks
3. Services and interconnections of high speed networks
4. Technologies for High speed optical networks
5. Optical burst switching
6. End-to-end applications
7. Optical control plan
8. Advanced optical technology architectures
9. Design of high speed systems and networks
10. Methodologies and development tools for high speed networks

Mobile and Ad hoc networks

1. Mobile technology and fundamentals

2. Analytical and validation models for mobility
3. Architecture and routing protocols for mobile networks
4. Architectures, frameworks, fundamentals on ad hoc networks
5. Energy efficient design, cross-layer design, scalability
6. MAC protocols for ad-hoc and sensor networks (801.11, Bluetooth, etc.)
7. Data, information, and signal processing in mobile networks
8. Complexity analysis of mobile algorithms and protocols
9. Software platforms and development tools supporting mobility
10. QoS/SLA, access control and security in mobile and ad hoc networks
11. Location and mobility management
12. Location and service discovery in ad hoc networks
13. Planning, provisioning, and deployment mobility features
14. Directional and smart antennas for mobile and ad-hoc networks
15. Performance and security in ad hoc and mobile networks
16. Self-organization, synchronization and stability in ad hoc networks
17. Self-management in ad hoc and mobile networks
18. Ad hoc and mobile networks and autonomic computing
19. Mobile ad hoc platforms, systems and tools
20. Applications over ad hoc networks
21. Standards evolution on mobility and ad hoc networks

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1.2 TELECOMMUNICATIONS

Management, operation and control networks

1. Monitoring telecommunicaitons systems

2. Network management contingency challenges
3. Real-time traffic and QoS
4. Performance and QoS, traffic engineering (MPLS, Diffserv, Intserv, Etc.)
5. Telecommunications management and control of heterogeneous networks

Optical Technologies

1. Standards for optical internetworking

2. Optical networks for future Internet design
3. Multi-domain routing protocols for IP over optical networks
4. Control and management protocols for IP over optical networks
5. Next-generation IP networking and Optical Internet
6. Development prospect for Optical Internet
7. Optical transmission systems and technologies
8. Optical access systems and technologies

Chapter 2 NETWORKING

Following is the list of current main topics and their subtopics given as below:

2.1 NETWORKS

1. Wireless communications (satellite, WLL, 4G, Ad Hoc, sensor networks)

2. Next generation networks [NGN] principles
3. Storage area networks [SAN]
4. Access and home networks
5. High-speed networks
6. Optical networks
7. Peer-to-peer and overlay networking
8. Mobile networking and systems
9. MPLS-VPN, IPSec-VPN networks
10. GRID networks
11. Broadband networks
12. Quality of service, service level agreement [QoS/SLA]
13. Reliability, availability, serviceabiliy [RAS]
14. Traffic engineering, metering, monitoring
15. Voice over IP services
16. Performance evaluation, tools, simulation
17. Network, control and service architectures
18. Network signalling, pricing and billing

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 19. Network middleware
20. Telecommunication networks architectures

Multi Provider QoS/SLA Internetworking

1. Architectures, frameworks, mechanisms for admission control and measurement

2. QoS in multi-provider and multi-technology networks
3. Service classes and multi-provider service class discovery
4. Service level agreement and service assurance in multi-provider environments
5. Carrier-class end-to-end SLA and QoS monitoring and management

Grid Networks and Services

1. GRID theory, frameworks, methodologies, architecture, ontology

2. GRID infrastructure and technologies
3. GRID middleware
4. GRID protocols and networking
5. GRID computing, utility computing, autonomic computing, metacomputing

Deploying the Future Infrastructure

1. IP Upgrade - An Engineering Exercise or a Necessity?

2. Worldwide IPv6 Adoption - Trends and Policies
3. National Strategies in Stimulating IPv6 Adoption
4. IPv6 in Government Infrastructures - Specific Requirements
5. IPv6 Infrastructures for Emergency Response and Law Enforcement - MetroNet6
6. Communications Equipment Certification for IPv6 Support
7. IPv6 in Broadband Networks
8. IPv6 Programs, from Research to Knowledge Dissemination

GRID over Optical Burst Switching Networks

1. Terabit burst switching

2. Burst assembly for IP DiffServ over optical burst switching networks
3. Optical network infrastructure for Grid
4. Synchronous stream optical burst switching
5. Optical burst switching based GRID architecture
6. Reliable optical burst switching for next-generation Grid networks
7. Throughput for Grid optical burst switching Grid networks.
8. Resiliency paths over the optical Grid networks
9. Consumer oriented Grids using optical burst switching
10. Protocols for optical burst switched Grid networks
11. Hybrid optical switching for data-intensive media Grid
12. Anycast routing in optical burst switched Grid networks
13. Optical burst switching for IP-over-WDM/DWDM
14. Customizable Grid-to-optical network
15. Ultra high capacity optical networks

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 16. Hybrid optical burst/circuit switched for Grid-enabled optical networks
17. Job scheduling in optical burst switching Grid networks
18. Architecture and middleware for Grid-Over-OBS

2.2 ACCESS NETWORKS

Next generation access technologies

1. Interactivity, unlimited access and full-scale media support

2. Energy-aware and efficiency-oriented technologies
3. Sustainable access network business (standard DSL vs. fiber vs. wireless access)
4. 3G/4G wireless technologies
5. Multiservice access (DSL, fiber, WiMAX, POTS)
6. FTTH
7. Ethernet P2P vs. xPON
8. FTTx with VDSL2, or Ethernet, or DOCSIS 3.0
9. Radio extension, 802.xx (Wi-Fi, WiMax, etc.)
10. LTE, LTE-advanced
11. IMT-advanced networks
12. Mesh and relay networks (IEEE 802.11s, IEEE802.16j, etc.)
13. Quality of experience (QoE)

Broadband wireless Internet access

1. New architectures, technologies, protocols for broadband wireless access

2. QoS in mobile and broadband wireless access networks
3. Broadcast and multicast support
4. Physical and data link layer issues
5. Medium access control, SLA and QoS
6. Radio resource management and call admission control
7. Space-time coding for broadband wireless Internet
8. Modulation, coding and antennas (MIMO)
9. Spectrum management
10. Scalability and reliability issues
11. Wireless mesh networks
12. Capacity planning and traffic engineering
13. Security and privacy issues
14. Interoperability aspects (fixed/mobile LANs/MANs, WANs)
15. Experiences/lessons from recent deployments

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Chapter 3 WIRELESS AND MOBILE COMMUNICATION

Following is the list of current main topics and their subtopics given as below:

3.1 WIRELESSES AND MOBILE COMMUNICATION

Protocols for wireless and mobility

1. Wireless protocols, architectural and design concepts

2. Protocols for air interfaces and networks
3. Wireless MAC protocols: Design and analysis
4. Transport layer issues in mobile and wireless networks
5. Middleware for handhelds and mobile services nodes
6. Proxies and middleware for wireless networks

Traffic and congestion control, QoS, Resource Management

1. Micro-mobility and macro-mobility

2. Wireless LANs
3. Home and Personal Area Networks: Bluetooth, ZigBeee, etc
4. Wireless MANs:802.16, 802.20
5. Wireless WANs: 2G/3G/4G
6. Mobile ad hoc networks and multi-hop wireless

Chapter 4 INTERNET

Following is the list of current main topics and their subtopics given as below:

4.1 EVOLVING INTERNET

Advanced Internet mechanisms

1. Access: call admission control vs. QoE vs. structural QoS / capability-based
access control vs. role-based access control vs. attribute-based access control
2. Routing and pricing models: BGP, pricing peering agreements using
microeconomics, topological routing vs. table-based routing vs. network coding,
power-efficient routing
3. Optimization in P2P/CDN networks: peer placement for streaming P2P, analysis
of P2P networks
4. Traffic engineering: estimating traffic matrices, constrained routing,
exponentially bounded burstness
5. Behavioral traffic recognition: identifying applications from traffic behavior

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 6. Traffic analysis: methods for analysis and visualization of multidimensional
measurements, characterizing protocols
7. Software defined radio networks: low power signal processing methods,
applications of machine learning
8. Cognitive radio: medium access, spatiotemporality, complexity, spectrum
sharing and leasing, channel selection, multi-stage pricing, cyclostationary
signatures, frame synchronization
9. Streaming video: learning from video, techniques for in-network modulation
10. Location: statistical location, partial measurements, delay estimation

Graph theory/topology/routing Internet support

1. Information theory: distributed network coding, Shannon's entropy, Nash

equilibrium
2. Optimization: LP, NLP, NeuroP, quadratic, convex programming, compressed
sensing
3. Graph theory: random graphs, spectra graph theory, percolations and phase
transitions, methods from statistical physics, geometric random graphs
4. Algebraic techniques: tensor analysis, matrix decomposition
5. Processing: signal processing techniques, equalization, point-process, source
coding vs. network coding, recoverability
6. Statistical machine learning: probabilistic graphical models, classification,
clustering, regression, classification, neural networks, support vector machines,
decision forests.
7. Game Theory/Microeconomic theory: social choice theory, equilibria, arbitrage
and incentive oriented distributed mechanism design, cooperative games, and
games on graphs
8. Stochastic network calculus
9. Fractal behavior and stability mechanisms
10. Kolmogorov complexity for performance evaluation
11. Complexity theory

Internet security mechanisms

1. Cryptography: design and analysis of cryptographic algorithms, applied

cryptography, cryptographic protocols and functions
2. Specification, validation design of security and dependability: security and trust
models, semantics and computational models for security and trust, business
models in security management, security policies models, security architectures,
formal methods for verification and certification, multi-level security
specification
3. Vulnerabilities, attacks and risks: methods of detection, analysis, prevention,
intrusion detection, tolerance, response and prevention, attacks and prevention
of on-line fraud, denial of services attacks and prevention methods
4. Access Control: authentication and non-repudiation, accounting and audit,
anonymity and pseudonymity
5. identity and trust management, biometric methods

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 6. Anti-malware techniques: detection, analysis, prevention
7. Cyber-crime response: anti-phishing, anti-spam, anti-fraud methods

Internet trust, security, and dependability levels

1. Network and transport level security

2. Network edge security controls: firewalls, packet filters, application gateways
3. Wireless and mobile network security: risks of wireless insecurity, wireless
vulnerabilities and intrusion detection, WLAN and WMAN MAC layer security
technologies, key management mechanisms and protocols, security in ad hoc,
sensor, mesh and personal communication networks
4. Security of Internet protocols: routing security, naming, network management,
signaling security, transport layer security
5. Network security policies: specification, implementation, deployment and
management
6. Security of P2P and overlay/middleware systems
7. Security for multiple domains, large-scale systems and critical infrastructures
8. Applications and high level services security: Web-based applications and
services, VoIP, multimedia streaming services, VoD and IPTV, collaborative
applications (conferencing), electronic commerce and eBusiness, eVoting, grid
computing, security of eGovernment
9. Intellectual property protection: digital rights management, licensing, metering,
watermarking, information hiding, implementations
10. Security services integration in complex architectures
11. Tradeoffs between security and efficiency, usability, reliability and cost.

Internet performance

1. Performance degradation and anomaly detection mechanisms

2. User-oriented performance metrics
3. Network and service provider-oriented performance metrics
4. Hybrid (chip and network) performance calculi
5. Intrusive and non-intrusive performance measurement mechanisms
6. Mechanisms for performance degradation-tolerant applications
7. Mechanisms for application performance and network performance
8. Performance enhancement mechanisms
9. Performance and traffic entropy algorithms
10. Performance prediction algorithms

Internet AQM/QoS

1. Buffer sizing, majorization, QoS routing, finite buffer queue vs. infinite buffer
queue and performance
2. Control theoretic framework for modeling of TCP and AQM schemes
3. Discrete mathematics to model buffer occupancy at queues of a network (given
workloads)
4. Game theoretic modeling of AQMs (mathematics to model selfish traffic)

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 5. Fairness models (proportional fairness, max-min fairness, low state global
fairness)
6. Optimization framework for congestion control, fairness and utility
maximization
7. Modeling and simulation of large network scenarios using queuing theory

4.2 INTERNET MONITORING AND PROTECTION

Internet traffic surveillance and interception

1. Methods and context to classify legal and illegal traffic

2. Methods and procedure to classify wanted and undesired traffic
3. Overloads, attacks, and failures
4. Detection of attacks via protocols and applications
5. Undesired traffic evaluation
6. Traffic identification caused by malicious code (spam, virii, and worms, etc.)
7. Traffic profile during disaster recovery,
8. Traffic during active emergency services
9. Early warning on growing undesired traffic
10. Access control and audit detection points
11. Denial of service
12. Spoofing
13. Lawful interception
14. Multi-modal undesired traffic detection
15. Measurements and data mining correlation

End-to-end sampling, measurement, and monitoring

1. Internet monitoring techniques and procedures

2. Monitoring tools, functions, and metrics
3. Combining, filtering, and reporting monitoring metrics
4. Theory and practice on sampling/inversion problem (accuracy, complexity, etc.)
5. Distributed and adaptive sampling techniques
6. Sampling & inverting traffic with passive and active systems
7. Internet end-to-end measurements from a sampling perspective
8. Impact of sampling on anomaly detection
9. Mechanisms for sampling the Internet traffic or collected traces
10. On-line and off-line metrics and measurements
11. Incident estimation and monitoring
12. Internet access monitoring
13. Spy software
14. Internet monitoring, filtering and blocking software
15. Monitoring Internet traffic to optimize network bandwidth
16. Remote monitoring

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4.3 FUTURE INTERNET

Internet Mechanisms

1. Internet protocols
2. Routing /multicast, on-demand, QoS-routing/etc./
3. Access control /multi technology/
4. Algorithms for broadband infrastructure
5. Address management /locator-location paradigm/
6. Recovering and fault-tolerance
7. In-network processing
8. Distributing computing /autonomic, on-demand, cloud/etc./
9. Context-aware and context recognition
10. Data-centers and nano-centers
11. Information processing /distribution, discovery, sharing/
12. Virtualization
13. Overlay infrastructure
14. Intelligent Web services
15. Service-centric networking

Challenging features

1. Internet computing
2. Distributed feature interaction
3. All-IP versus protocol translation
4. IP simplified network management
5. Security, trust, and privacy
6. Network stability under topology change
7. Delay-tolerant IP networks
8. Trustworthy Internet
9. Mobile computing
10. Ubiquitous computing
11. Reliability
12. Resilience
13. Scalability
14. User and service mobility
15. Wireless QoS
16. Traffic engineering
17. Network planning
18. Intermittent services
19. Virtualization
20. Self-management and control

Evolution of telecommunications network architectures

1. Advanced communications systems

2. New configurable protocols stacks and real-time mechanisms

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 3. Applications and services for next-generation architectures
4. Scalability and manageability of network architectures
5. Opportunistic and cooperative communications
6. Next generation networks (NGN)
7. Optical networks
8. Wireless networks, Mobile networks
9. Ad-Hoc, Sensor, Vehicle networks
10. Access, Residential, Last mile networks
11. Home, Body and Personal area Networks
12. Active networks
13. Self Organizing networks
14. Storage area networks
15. Peer-to-Peer and overlay networks
16. Network measurements and testbeds
17. Transmission technologies (e.g., Ultra Wideband)

Networking and service differentiation

1. Network design and planning

2. Network management and control
3. Traffic engineering
4. Traffic control, Flow control
5. Congestion and admission control
6. QoS support and Performance
7. Routing, Switching, QoS routing
8. Mobility management
9. Multicast
10. Service reliability, availability.

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