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European Wireless 2010 - LUCCA  
Registration:
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Important Deadlines:
Paper Submission
November 8, 2009
Extended Deadline

Notification of Acceptance
January 25, 2010

Camera-Ready Version Due
February 28, 2010

Proposals for Tutorials
December 31, 2009

Notification of Acceptance for Tutorial Proposals
February 15, 2010

Topology Control Approaches and Cross-Layer Design in Wireless Multi-hop Networks

Tutorial summary

Power control has been extensively suggested and employed for achieving efficient resource management/allocation in wireless networks. Especially in multi-hop topologies, such as ad hoc, sensor, vehicular and mesh networks, power control may be realized in the form of Topology Control, according to which, nodes are able to implicitly control their local neighborhoods by varying their transmission powers. Topology Control addresses an inherent tradeoff between reducing energy consumption and maintaining strong connectivity, which may be appropriately balanced by the network, depending on the requirements of each application scenario. The importance of such tradeoff constitutes Topology Control a promising capability for designers and operators of contemporary multi-hop networking systems.

In this half-day tutorial the focus will be on the introduction of Topology Control for wireless multi-hop networks, from a systems-based point of view, emphasizing on the control capabilities offered by such techniques. Topology Control approaches, described in the form of generic control loops, will be classified according to the design principle that each one of them follows and their key features will be summarized and compared against each other. Emphasis will be given on the mechanisms that constitute critical control loops (both at the node and network level) and allow autonomic behavior of distributed large systems. Inherent challenges of Topology Control will be identified and guidelines for effectively addressing them will be provided, thus enabling researchers active in the areas of wireless multi-hop networks to avoid underlying pitfalls.

In the final part of the tutorial a novel Topology Control based protocol stack will be presented, which generalizes the notion of local neighborhood control as a cross-layer control loop over the traditional protocol stack. Emphasis will be given on the parameters that should be considered in appropriately orchestrating the various mechanisms of the Physical, MAC and Routing layers through vertical Topology Control mechanisms and the unique control capabilities offered by a protocol stack, which is better organized in terms of data flow and timing synchronization. Last but not least, implications for the network architecture and interfaces with legacy and current network systems will be provided, to allow researchers and professionals exploit the features of the proposed stack in realistic systems.

The specific topics covered by the lecture will include the following (in an indicative presentation sequence):
  • Introduction to Topology Control.
  • Topology Control as a tradeoff-balancing (control) mechanism.
  • Classification of Topology Control approaches.
  • Overview of each Topology Control category. Presentation of the most representative approaches from each category and their salient features.
  • Overall feature comparison of presented approaches.
  • Research challenges in Topology Control and open problems.
  • A novel Topology Control-based cross-layer protocol stack.
  • Implications to network architecture.
  • Summary and conclusions.

Speakers Resumes