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Recently, we have seen an evolution of programmable network devices, where it is possible to customize packet processing inside the data plane at an unprecedented level. This is in contrast to traditional approaches, where networking device functionality is fixed and defined by the ASIC and customers need to wait possibly years before the vendors release new versions that add features required by customers. The vendors in the industry have adapted and the focus has shifted to offering new types of network devices, such as the SmartNIC, IPU, and DPU. Another major paradigm shift in the networking area is the shift towards protocols that encrypt parts of headers and contents of packets such as QUIC. Also, many devices such as smart phones have support for multiple access networks, which requires efficient multipath protocols to leverage the capabilities of multiple networks at the same time. However, when using protocols inside the network that requires encryption such as QUIC or multipath QUIC, packet processing operations for the en/decryption process are very resource intensive. Consequently, network vendors and operators are in need to accelerate and offload crypto operations to dedicated hardware in order to free CPU cycles for business critical operations. Therefore, the aim of this study is to investigate how multipath QUIC can be offloaded or hardware accelerated in order to reduce the CPU utilization on the server. Our contributions are an evaluation of frameworks, programming languages and hardware devices in terms of crypto offloading functionality. Two packet processing offloading prototypes were designed using the DPDK framework and the programming language P4. The design using DPDK was implemented and evaluated on a BlueField 2 DPU. The offloading prototype handles a major part of the packet processing and the crypto operations in order to reduce the load of the user application running on the host. A evaluation show that the throughput when using larger keys are only slightly decreased. The evaluation gives important insights in the need of crypto engines and/or CPUs with high performance when offloading.

Yes / Recent studies suggest that multicarrier systems using wavelets outperform conventional OFDM systems using the FFT, in that they have well-contained side lobes, improved spectral efficiency and BER performance, and they do not require a cyclic prefix. Here we study the wavelet packet and discrete wavelet transforms, comparing the BER performance of wavelet transform-based multicarrier systems and Fourier based OFDM systems, for multipath Rayleigh channels with AWGN. In the proposed system zero-forcing channel estimation in the frequency domain has been used. Results confirm that discrete wavelet-based systems using Daubechies wavelets outperform both wavelet packet transform- based systems and FFT-OFDM systems in terms of BER. Finally, Alamouti coding and maximal ratio combining schemes were employed in MIMO environments, where results show that the effects of multipath fading were greatly reduced by the antenna diversity.

yes / Empirical modeling of wireless fading channels using common schemes such as autoregression and thefinitestate Markov chain (FSMC) is investigated. The conceptual background of both channel structures and the establishment of their mutual dependence in a confined manner are presented. The novel contribution lies in the proposal of a new approach for deriving the state transition probabilities borrowed from economic disciplines, which has not been studied so far with respect to the modeling of FSMC wireless fading channels. The proposed approach is based on equal portioning of the received signal-to-noise ratio, realized by using an alternative probability construction that was initially highlighted by Tauchen. The associated statistical procedure shows that afirst-order FSMC with a limited number of channel states can satisfactorily approximate fading. The computational overheads of the proposed technique are analyzed andproven to be less demanding compared to the conventional FSMC approach based on the levelcrossing rate. Simulations confirm the analytical results and promising performance of the new channel modelbased on the Tauchen approach without extracomplexity costs.

Video communications play a vital role in present and future wireless ad hoc networks. One of the key requirements for a successful deployment of multimedia applications in multihop wireless networks is the ability to provide an acceptable video quality, even under a highly dynamic and perhaps unfriendly (or hostile) environment (e.g., in the presence of frequent node/link failure, interference, shadowing, fading, and so forth). Existing ad hoc routing protocols work well for data communications, but are not optimized for video, which is sensitive to latency and packet loss. Moreover, traditional end system based error control mechanisms alone cannot guarantee a sustainable video quality. Conventional QoS approaches typically optimize one or more network layer metrics, but they are usually agnostic to any kind of application layer performance. Consequently, new methodologies must be explored to improve the performance of video applications in multihop wireless networks. This dissertation directly addresses this important problem area by leveraging recent advances in video coding techniques along with novel cross-layer formulations and powerful optimization techniques. We follow an application centric cross-layer approach to address multimedia service provisioning over ad hoc networks. Our research efforts show that video communications over multihop wireless networks can substantially benefit from a cross-layer design principle by factoring in application layer video quality into routing algorithmic designs at the network layer. There are three components in this investigation, namely, (1) concurrent routing, (2) path selection and rate allocation, and (3) multipath routing for multiple description video. Each component addresses one or more unique challenges that hinder video communications in multihop wireless networks. Although we expect that a cross-layer approach will be more effective than a network centric (single-layer) approach in addressing application performance, it also brings in complex problems that cannot be effectively solved using traditional methods, and thus, calls for the design of customized algorithms. In concurrent routing, we focus on issues that arise while supporting multiple concurrent video communication sessions in an ad hoc network. These sessions compete for limited network resources (such as bandwidth) while interacting with each other. Such inter-session interactions couple the performance of an individual flow with that of other flows. Applying a video centric cross-layer design principle, we model the end-to-end video distortion as a function of network layer behavior, and formulate a network-wide optimal routing problem that minimizes the total video distortion. Results based on computational experiments performed using randomly generated network topologies establish the relative efficacy and robustness of the proposed genetic algorithm based solution approach. Specifically, we demonstrate that our approach outperforms other trajectory based metaheuristic approaches as well as with conventional network centric routing algorithms such as shortest path and disjoint shortest path routing. The joint path selection and rate allocation problem considers not only selecting the best set of paths for video communication, but also, computing the optimal video encoding rate and partitioning it among the chosen set of paths. The end-to-end video distortion is modeled as a function of network layer resources by capturing the tight coupling that exists between the optimal encoding rate for each video session, the selection of paths for video transmission, and the allocation of traffic among these selected paths. This problem is formulated as a nonlinear nonconvex programming problem, for which a tight linear programming relaxation is constructed via the Reformulation-Linearization Technique (RLT). This construct is embedded within a specialized branch-and-bound algorithm to achieve global optimality. Computational experience is reported for various problem instances, and the results validate the robustness of the proposed algorithmic procedure. The results exhibit the advantage of the solution approach over the popularly used max-min rate allocation scheme. The emergence of Multiple Description (MD) coding technique offers great potential for multipath routing of video in multihop wireless networks. In studying multipath routing for MD coding, we show that MD coded video, when used in combination with multipath routing in wireless networks, has tremendous advantages over traditional layered video coding techniques. We discuss how to implement an MD video codec and formulate a cross-layer optimization problem that can find a set of optimal paths, (one for each description) such that the overall video quality at the receiver is maximized. We further devise a specialized RLT-based branch-and-bound solution procedure for the ensuing 0-1 mixed integer nonconvex optimization problem. Convergence behavior of the proposed solution procedure is observed for various network topologies and the results further demonstrate the performance advantage of the proposed cross-layer approach over non-cross-layer approaches. The scope of this research is highly interdisciplinary. It intersects video communication, networking, optimization, and algorithm design. We expect that the theoretical and algorithmic results of this investigation will serve as important building blocks in developing a comprehensive methodology for addressing complex cross-layer problems in the area of wireless ad hoc networks. / Ph. D.

Over the past decade, the market for wireless service has grown at an unprecedented rate. The industry has grown from cellular phones and pagers to broadband and ultra-broadband (also called ultra-wideband) wireless services that can provide voice, data, and full-motion video in real time. This growing hunger for faster data rates and larger bandwidths has prompted a need for a deeper understanding of the wireless channels upon which these devices communicate. In order for the visions of real time full-motion video, multimedia, and high speed data delivery inherent in the 3rd and 4th generations of wireless communication standards to be fully realized, system design engineers must have a thorough understanding of the wireless channels upon which these devices operate. Additionally, for these networks to deliver their promised data rates, they must operate at very high microwave and millimeter-wave frequencies, where large segments of spectrum are readily obtained. Unfortunately, little is known about the propagation characteristics at these frequencies and bandwidths. As a consequence, there has been a significant demand for wireless test equipment that is capable of characterizing these new wireless channels. The objective of this research was to design and develop a wireless test instrument that can not only characterize these new wireless channels, but has the portability to be quickly and easily re-located to various measurement sites, as well as the flexibility to characterize a wide variety of frequencies and bandwidths in addition to the ultrawideband channels investigated in this work. This measurement system is also designed to be capable of characterizing both the magnitude and phase response of these wireless channels, which not only provides a more complete channel characteristic, but the potential capability to measure the Doppler spectrum introduced by a dynamic channel. / Master of Science

Video communication is an important application in wireless ad hoc network environment. Although current off-the-shelf video communication software would work for ad hoc network operating under stable conditions (e.g., extremely low link and node failures), video communications for ad hoc network operating under extreme conditions remain a challenging problem. This is because traditional video codec, either single steam or layered video, requires at least one relatively stable path between source and destination nodes. Recent advances in multiple description (MD) video coding have opened up new possibilities to offer video communications over ad hoc networks. In this thesis, we perform a systematic study on MD video for ad hoc networks. The theoretical foundation of this research is based on an application-centric approach to formulate a cross-layer multipath routing problem that minimizes the application layer video distortion. The solution procedure to this complex optimization problem is based on the so-called Genetic Algorithm (GA). The theoretical results have been documented in [7] and will be reviewed in Chapter 2. Although the theoretical foundation for MD video over dynamic ad hoc networks has been laid, there remains a lot of skepticisms in the research community on whether such cross-layer optimal routing can be implemented in practice. To fill this gap, this thesis is devoted to the experimental research (or proof-of-concept) for the work in [7]. Our approach is to design and implement an emulation testbed where we can actually implement the ideas and algorithms proposed in [7] in a controlled laboratory setting. The highlights of our experimental research include: 1. A testbed that emulates three properties of a wireless ad hoc network: topology, link success probability, and link bandwidth; 2. A source routing implementation that can easily support comparative study between the proposed GA-based routing with other routing schemes under different network conditions; 3. A modified H.263+ video codec that employs Unequal Error Protection (UEP) approach to generate MD video; 4. Implementation of three experiments that • compared the GA-based routing with existing technologies (NetMeeting video conferencing plus AODV routing); • compared our GA-based routing with network-centric routing schemes (two-disjoint paths routing); • proved that our approach has great potential in supporting video communications in wireless ad hoc networks. 5. Experimental results that show the proposed cross-layer optimization significantly outperforms the current off-the-shelf technologies, and that the proposed cross-layer optimization provides much better performance than network-centric routing schemes in supporting routing of MD video. In summary, the experimental research in this thesis has demonstrated that a cross-layer multipath routing algorithm can be practically implemented in a dynamic ad hoc network to support video communications. / Master of Science

The L5 signal of the Global Positioning System (GPS) is becoming available on an increasing number of Block IIF satellites. As the third civilian signal, L5 is superior in signal design to the L1 C/A and L2C civilian signals. This new signal has been marked healthy for use on selected satellites since 2010, yet the hardware capable of tracking the L5 signal is still in the early stages of development. This work investigates the characteristics of the new signal and the quality of data produced by L5-tracking receivers. Commonly used receiver models chosen for this study are the Leica GRX1200+GNSS, the Trimble NetR8, and the Javad Delta TRE-G3TH. The metrics used in this analysis to assess the quality of data produced by these receivers are signal strength, receiver phase noise, receiver code noise, and multipath. The data used in these analyses were obtained from the International GNSS Service for the days of the year 275 to 281 in 2011. Metrics averaged over the GPS week 1656 provide a good indication of the overall performance of the receivers. / text