Marios Logothetis

Customizable Autonomic Network Management: Integrating Autonomic Network Management and Software-Defined Networking

The increased complexity of emerging and future networks and services requires the use of sophisticated but simplified management and control that will minimize the burden of human presence and manual operation. Autonomic network management (ANM), on the one hand, and software defined networking (SDN), on the other hand, have appeared with the promise to meet these requirements and enhance the efficiency of the control and operation of networks. These two emerging technologies share motivation and have confluent goals, e.g., increasing the reliability and efficiency of operation, simplifying network management and control, focusing on means for opening innovation and differentiation for vendors, and aiming at capital expenditures/operating expenditures (CAPEX/OPEX) reduction for providers. This article presents and promotes a framework that extends the G?ANT test bed toward an autonomic OpenFlow (AUTOFLOW) facility, aiming at (1) demystifying the relationship and interplay between ANM and SDN and (2) showcasing that SDN/OpenFlow capabilities can bring customizable ANM into reality.

Performance Evaluation of Cognitive Management Functionality for Emergency Healthcare Applications

Enormous advances in medical sciences are depicted on their capability to approach previously past-cure diseases, as well as prevent the appearance and evolution of unpleasant situations. Those advances are often derived from interdisciplinary solutions to complex medical problems, supported by communications and electronics, which target fast, reliable and stable solutions to problems that are demanding in terms of velocity and accuracy. Recent findings in the world of wireless communications, such as the systems beyond the third generation (B3G), as well as the utilization of knowledge and experience by means of cognitive networking principles, can be efficiently exploited, in order to support electronic healthcare, especially in emergency situations. The goal of this paper is to present intelligent management functionality based on cognitive, B3G communication systems, capable of supporting emergency, electronic healthcare applications. Simulation results using the Network Simulator-2 (NS-2) are used for evaluating the performance of the proposed functionality. Results show a significant increase in the dependability and the efficiency of medical applications when supported by cognitive wireless networks.

Application and mobility aware integration of opportunistic networks with wireless infrastructures

The wireless world is migrating towards an era that will comprise wireless network infrastructure, as well as more temporary structures which, for instance, can be called Opportunistic Networks (ONs). ONs can comprise various terminals, potentially organized in an ad-hoc mode, and be terminated at a set of access points of the infrastructure-based network. In this context, an operator, owning a wireless network infrastructure, can exploit ONs for complementing the infrastructure, e.g., in order to resolve coverage expansions or for achieving green targets. Given the existence of opportunities in terms of available nodes and spectrum, the suitability of creating an ON can be determined by the type of involved applications and mobility levels. The decision to create or not an ON will be dynamic, should respect traffic and mobility aspects and should also envisage anticipated QoS and energy related benefits for the whole network. Framed within this statement, this paper aims at the investigation of those conditions under which the creation of an ON will be beneficiary for the overall network. This investigation is based on extensive network simulations and under certain circumstances the scheme may designate solutions that can offer adequate QoS.

Deriving Policies Based on the Evaluation of the Suitability of Integrating Opportunistic Networks with Wireless Infrastructures

It is expected that the wireless world will need to encompass more local/temporary structures which can be created for exploiting dynamically appearing opportunities. Such structures, which can be called Opportunistic Networks (ONs), may comprise various terminals/devices, potentially organized in an infrastructure-less (ad-hoc) network mode, and be terminated at a set of access points of the infrastructure-based network. In this context, an operator owning a wireless network infrastructure, can exploit ONs for complementing the infrastructure, e.g., in order to resolve coverage expansions or for achieving green targets. Given the existence of opportunities in terms of available nodes and spectrum, the suitability of creating an ON can be determined by the type of involved applications and mobility levels. In this respect this paper aims to evaluate the suitability of establishing an ON as an extension to the wireless infrastructure by considering the anticipated benefits that such integration will bring about. The evaluation is based on extensive simulations so as to increase validity of results and recommendations with respect to the investigated ON suitability conditions. Finally, the simulation results and recommendations extracted from this evaluation study are used to derive policies that can be used by the operator of the wireless infrastructure to control the decision upon creating the ONs.

Performance evaluation of the suitability of Opportunistic Networks for the Future Internet

The wireless world is migrating towards an era that will comprise wireless network infrastructure, as well as more local/temporary structures which, for instance, can be called Opportunistic Networks (ONs). ONs can comprise various terminals/devices, potentially organized in an infrastructure-less (ad-hoc) network mode, and be terminated at a set of access points of the infrastructure-based network. The decision of the infrastructure-based network, to create or not such a ONs will be dynamic, should respect traffic, energy and mobility aspects and should also envisage anticipated QoS related benefits for the whole network. Framed within this statement, this paper aims at recommending whether and when the creation of such a ONs will be beneficiary for the overall network. Indicative simulation results are presented, which yield the conditions in which the adoption of such a solution can lead to enhanced application provision, extended access capabilities, better resource utilization, lower costs and management decisions with a “greener” footprint.

Intelligent Management Functionality for Emergency Medical Applications Based on Cognitive Networking Principles

Telecommunications and information technology rapidly migrate towards the Future Internet (FI) era, which is characterized by powerful and complex network infrastructures, advanced applications, services and content, efficient power management as well as extensions in the business model. One of the main application areas that find prosper ground in the FI era, is medicine. In particular, latest advances in medical sciences are reflected on their capability to approach previously past-cure diseases, as well as to prevent the appearance and evolution of unpleasant situations. Those advances are often derived from interdisciplinary solutions to complex medical problems, supported by communications and electronics, which target fast, reliable and stable solutions to problems that are demanding in terms of velocity and accuracy. The goal of this paper is to present intelligent, knowledge-based management functionality capable of supporting emergency medical applications. An indicative emergency medical scenario is provided, along with extensive simulation results using the Network Simulator-2 (NS-2), for evaluating the performance of the proposed functionality.