“Autonomic and Spontaneous Networks” Project Program

Description | Research themes

 

This program falls within the framework of Institut Télécom's Project-Programs which are designed to launch and develop, within the Institut Télécom and its schools, research activities on emerging, transverse and prospective themes to promote innovation within the Group.

The Program is managed by a group comprising :

  • Annie Gravey (Télécom Bretagne),
  • Daniel Kofman (Télécom ParisTech),
  • Jean Leneutre (TELECOM ParisTech),
  • Yves Roudier (Eurécom),
  • Monique Becker (INT),
  • Isabelle Demeure (Télécom ParisTech),
  • Guy Bernard (INT),
  • Antoine Beugnart (Télécom Bretagne),
  • Ana Cavalli (INT) and Frédéric Cuppens (Télécom Bretagne) who manage the Group.

Description and objectives of the Program

See program presentation
Consult Detailed Executive Summary

The principles of centralized management are increasingly difficult to apply to new network types, requiring large quantities of heterogeneous nodes, depending on many entities and often operating in a context of mobility. To tackle these problems, the notions of autonomic and spontaneous networks have been introduced

An autonomic network is a network that manages to offer a self-configuring service cooperating directly with no outside intervention from any given management system.

The notion of spontaneous network additionally implies that, amongst a large quantity of elements capable of interconnecting, some of them "decide" to configure between them to form a network that will function autonomously. A spontaneous community of communicating nodes is therefore created, which is then self-configured to become an autonomic network to provide a given service.

Program research themes

The Project Program focuses on autonomic and spontaneous networks on radio supports and has identified three sub-themes of research :

Architecture and functioning of spontaneous networks

This sub-theme is devoted to multilayer (1 to 4) network design implemented more or less spontaneously :

  • sensor networks,
  • ad-hoc networks,
  • mesh networks.

Middleware for spontaneous networks

Middleware for spontaneous networks must meet a number of challenges:

  • avoid recourse to the customer/server model and favor symmetrical models
  • take account of limited capacities (energy, memory capacities, bandwidth)
  • reliability
  • security
  • performance / scale-up

Security in spontaneous networks

Due to their dynamic and heterogeneous characteristics, spontaneous networks raise many security problems in terms of confidentiality, integrity and availability.

Solutions are needed for the following problems:

  • trust modeling,
  • expression and implementation of security policies adapting dynamically to the context
  • definition of negotiation protocols to reconcile security policies wherever possible.