Large-scale wireless sensor networks consist of thousands of tiny and low cost nodes with very limited energy, computing power and communication capabilities. They have a myriad of possible applications. They can be used in hazardous and hostile environments to sense for deadly gases and high temperatures, in personal area networks to monitor vital signs, in military and civilian environments for intrusion detection and tracking, emergency operations, etc. In large scale wireless sensor networks the protocols need to be scalable and energy-efficient. Further, new strategies are needed to address the well-known energy depletion problem that nodes close to the sink node face. In this thesis the Scalable Energy-efficient Location-Aided Routing (SELAR) protocol for wireless sensor networks is proposed to solve the above mentioned problems. In SELAR, nodes use location and energy information of the neighboring nodes to perform the routing function. Further, the sink node is moved during the network operation to increase the network lifetime. By means of simulations, the SELAR protocol is evaluated and compared with two very well-known protocols - LEACH (Low-Energy Adaptive-Clustering Hierarchy) and MTE (Minimum Transmission Energy). The results indicate that in realistic senarios,SELAR delivers up to 12 times more and up to 1.4 times more data packets to the base station than LEACH and MTE respectively. It was also seen from the results that for realistic scenarios, SELAR with moving base station has up to 5 times and up to 27 times more lifetime duration compared to MTE and LEACH respectively.

Downscaling of technology causes signal integrity problems due to crosstalk between closely-spaced interconnect lines. Existing crosstalk estimation and optimization techniques operate at the layout-level of circuits and fail to utilize the efficient design-space exploration at the high-level. To address this, we propose word-level statistical techniques which estimate crosstalk between bus lines: (1) Given a data stream, the first technique simply counts the number of crosstalk events on each bus line. The drawback of this technique is that the execution time is proportional to the stream length. This is overcome by the second enumerative technique which is purely statistical in nature. (2) Given word-level statistics, we estimate the bit-level crosstalk probability of bus lines. (3) We further speedup the statistical method using a non-enumerative technique by linearizing its complexity with respect to the bus width. Average errors of less than 15% are obtained for bus-widths ranging from 8b to 32b while execution times are reduced by two orders of magnitude, compared to HSPICE. We then measure the crosstalk susceptibility of nets in the post global routing phase (performed using CADENCE Silicon Ensemble), prior to detailed routing using (1) Pt , the probability of crosstalk on victims in different regions along their route; and (2) Vpeak, the maximum crosstalk noise amplitude experienced by victims along their route. Pt is estimated using the fast and accurate statistical estimator we previously proposed. Vpeak is estimated by predicting the cross-coupling capacitances between neighboring wires, using their global routing information. Average errors are less than 8%, compared to HSPICE. We combine the crosstalk susceptibility values from individual regions along a victim wire’s route, to obtain a single susceptibility value for the entire wire. Further, we propose a register binding technique during high-level synthesis to minimize crosstalk at the register outputs in the RT-level design. It involves modification of the cliquepartitioning algorithm to make crosstalk-aware choices of edges to be mapped to the same register. RT-level comparisons between the regular and crosstalk-aware designs show upto 16% reduction in crosstalk activity at the register outputs.

Ad hoc networks have gained significant importance and gathered huge momentum within the wireless network research community. We explore the novel idea of applying ad hoc networking for urban search and rescue operations. Several algorithms have been proposed and implemented for routing in ad hoc networks and their performance have been thoroughly analyzed. But none of the prior work deals specifically for search and rescue operations, which entail certain specific criteria such as prevention of node loss, maximizing the area of coverage and constant and instantaneous access to a main controller. In this thesis, we propose a centralized and adaptive algorithm tailored for efficient performance of mobile nodes assisting in search and rescue operations. The proposed algorithm assists in finding and maintaining stable links between the mobile nodes and base station, while optimizing the area of coverage and energy efficiency of the nodes. The algorithm is implemented using ns (network simulator), and its performance is compared with that of a widely used ad hoc routing protocol, Ad hoc On-demand Distance Vector (AODV) routing protocol. We use frequency of link breakages, network throughput and routing overhead as our performance metrics. This algorithm can also be extended to provide support for routing among mobile nodes.

The rapid growth of the Internet, in the last few years, has generated a need to enhance the existing IP networks in the areas of availability, dependability and scalability in order to provide a mission critical networking environment. In contemporary IP networks, data packets are routed as a function of the destination address and a single metric such as hop-count or delay. This approach tends to cause message traffic to converge onto the same link, which significantly increases congestion and leads to unbalanced network resource utilization. One solution to this problem is provided by Traffic Engineering (TE), which uses, bandwidth guaranteed, Explicitly Routed Label Switched Paths (ER-LSPs). Due to the dramatic increase in the backbone speeds, current research focuses more on traffic engineering with LSPs for clear control over the traffic distribution in the network. However, the growing popularity of the Internet is driving the Internet Service Providers to adapt new technologies in order to support multiple classes of applications with different characteristics and performance requirements. Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS), which was proposed by the IETF provides essential facilities for traffic engineering and reliable QoS services for the Internet. MPLS networks provide the required flexibility for operators to manage their traffic with ER-LSPs. Even though conventional routing algorithms support the ER-LSP setup in MPLS networks, they are not efficient in link residual capacity information updates and limit resource utilization, which eventually leads to LSP failures and unbalanced network resource utilization. This thesis proposes a new architecture with a cluster based distributed routing algorithm to setup bandwidth guaranteed ER-LSPs in MPLS backbone networks. The proposed routing algorithm confines the route discovery region in order to reduce the routing overhead and computes all possible routes from ingress node to egress node. Based on LSP requirements and network load conditions, the egress node selects the most suitable path from the available paths in order to setup the LSP. This routing scheme optimizes network resource utilization by evenly distributing traffic throughout the network. The Resource Reservation Protocol (RSVP) works in conjunction with the routing protocol for resource reservation and label distribution along the LSP.

Le passage à l’échelle des protocoles de routage est un des problèmes les plus critiques pour les réseauxmobiles sans fil à grande envergure. Dans ce cadre, le concept de clusterisation peut être mis à profit dans lafonction de routage afin d’améliorer les performances de ces réseaux. En premier lieu, cette thèse présentenotre algorithme de clusterisation à 1-saut alpha-SSCA (α-Stability Structure Clustering Algorithm) qui apour objectif d’améliorer la stabilité de la structure des clusters. Un algorithme générique de clusterisationà K-sauts est également proposé en ayant le même but de stabilité visé par alpha-SSCA tout en réduisant lenombre de clusters générés et en étant indépendant de la métrique d’élection des cluster-heads. Ensuite, nousprésentons notre proposition d’un protocole de routage à état des liens des clusters qui exploite les apports denotre mécanisme de clusterisation α-SSCA. Ce protocole, appelé CLSR (Cluster-based Link State Routing),vise à réduire le trafic de contrôle afin d’améliorer les performances du réseau à large échelle. Nous avonsproposé aussi une version hiérarchique du protocole CLSR. Ce protocole de routage introduit une hiérarchiedans la structure des clusters qui permet de réduire le nombre de clusters en groupement des clusters prochesdans un même cluster. L’objectif principal de ce protocole hiérarchique est d’améliorer la scalabilité de CLSRquand le nombre de noeuds dans le réseau augmente considérablement. / Scalability is one of critical challenges for routing protocols in large scale mobile wireless networks. In thiscontext, clustering technique seems a promising approach to overcome the scalability problem. First, we proposea one hop clustering algorithm, alpha-SSCA (alpha-Stability Structure Clustering Algorithm), whichaims to improve the stability of the clusters structure. Second, we present a proposal of a generic K-hopsclustering algorithm which is independent of the metrics used to elect cluster-heads. The main contributionof this last algorithm is to enhance the stability of the clusters structure while reducing the number of clusters.Clustering mechanism is introduced in our proposed routing protocol CLSR (Cluster-based Link StateRouting) in order to reduce the control overhead. The main objective of CLSR is to take profit of the stablestructure of clusters to enhance the network scalability.We propose also a second proactive link-state protocolwhich is based on hierarchical clustering. This protocol makes use of hierarchical clustering to more reducethe routing overhead.

Au cours des quinze dernières années, le développement de plateformes embarquées intelligentes et les progrès des protocoles de communication radio ont permis l'émergence de réseaux de capteurs sans-fils (WSN). D'autre part, la démocratisation d'Internet et du Web, ainsi que l'augmentation des débits ont contribué à l'essor d'un nouveau paradigme : le Cloud computing. L'Internet des Objets, (IoT) ou Internet des Objets réalise la convergence entre les réseaux de capteurs et le Cloud computing. De nombreux travaux adressant les problématiques de l'IoT ont étés menés ces dix dernières années, cependant ces propositions manquent ne tiennent pas suffisamment compte des problématiques de sécurité et de protection des données. D'après Gartner, 70 % des plateformes déployées ne disposent pas d'une solution de sécurité efficace, les rendant vulnérables aux attaques. Dans le domaine des monnaies numériques, Bitcoin propose en son sein une nouvelle structure de données authentifiée et trustless permettant la décentralisation de l'enregistrement de transactions en s'appuyant sur un protocole permettant d'obtenir un consensus : la blockchain. Cette thèse se focalise sur l'utilisation de cette nouvelle structure de données dans les WSN dans un contexte IoT, comme base pour la définition d'une architecture sécurisée et adaptative basée sur la blockchain. Le but de cette architecture est d'intégrer les solutions existantes pour l'organisation du réseau et l'accès aux services de manière innovante afin de réaliser l'intégration des WSN avec l'infrastructure web; mais aussi d'y adjoindre une solution répondant aux nouveaux besoins de sécurités et contraintes spécifiques des réseaux de capteurs. Nous proposons pour cela un framework nommé Network Service Loader (NSL) en charge de la gestion de services et d'agents mobiles, auquel s'adjoint notre solution Blockchain Authentication and Trust Module (BATM) en charge de l'authentification, du contrôle d'accès, ainsi que des évaluations de confiance via l'algorithme Maximum Likelihood Trust Estimator (MLTE). / During the last fifteen years, the rise of smart and wireless enabled embedded devices lead to the development of wireless sensor networks (WSN). In the same time, the emerging of Cloud computing with the development of the Internet and the Web as an everyday technology thanks to the rise of bandwidth and processing power leads to new network paradigms. The Internet of Things (IoT) primary goal is to bridge the gap between these technologies and bring WSN sensing and actuating abilities to Cloud applications. We count a significant amount of work targetting the IoT in the last decade, however they lack proper solutions to ensure data privacy and security. Gartner investigations shows that 70 % of connected and smart devices provide little or no security policies and solutions, making both user and devices vulnerable to attackers. In the field of digital currencies, Bitcoin proposed a new authenticated and trustless data structure dedicated to transactions logging in a decentralized network with the help of a consensus protocol : the blockchain. This thesis is focused on bringing the blockchain technology as a new solutions for security in decentralized WSN in the IoT, providing the basis for a secure and adaptative agent-based middleware and execution framework. This framework attempt to federate existing work regarding the architecture of the IoT, but also to tackle security issues regarding network access, agent execution and trust evaluation. To achieve this goal, we propose Network Service Loader (NSL), an agent-based middleware constructed of existing protocols in a new way, along with a new solution called Blockchain Authentication and Trust Module (BATM) dedicated to node and users authentication, access control policies, and trust evaluation through our new Maximum Likelihood Trust Estimator (MLTE) algorithm.

This thesis addresses the problem of `efficient' broadcast in a multi-radio multi-channel multi-rate wireless mesh network (MR$^2$-MC WMN). In such a MR$^2$-MC WMN, nodes are equipped with multiple radio network interface cards, each tuned to an orthogonal channel, that can dynamically adjust transmission rate by choosing a modulation scheme appropriate for the channel conditions. We choose `broadcast latency', defined as the maximum delay between a packet's network-wide broadcast at the source and its eventual reception at all network nodes, as the `efficiency' metric of broadcast performance. The problem of constructing a broadcast forwarding structure having minimal broadcast latency is referred to as the `minimum-latency-broadcasting' (MLB) problem. While previous research for broadcast in single-radio single-rate wireless networks has highlighted the wireless medium's `\emph{wireless broadcast advantage}' (WBA); little is known regarding how the new features of MR$^2$-MC WMN may be exploited. We study in this thesis how the availability of multiple radio interfaces (tuned to orthogonal channels) at WMN nodes, and WMN's multi-rate transmission capability and WBA, might be exploited to improve the `broadcast latency' performance. We show the MLB problem for MR$^2$-MC WMN to be NP-hard, and resort to heuristics for its solution. We divide the overall problem into two sub-problems, which we address in two separate parts of this thesis. \emph{In the first part of this thesis}, the MLB problem is defined for the case of single-radio single-channel multi-rate WMNs where WMN nodes are equipped with a single radio tuned to a common channel. \emph{In the second part of this thesis}, the MLB problem is defined for MR$^2$-MC WMNs where WMN nodes are equipped with multiple radios tuned to multiple orthogonal channels. We demonstrate that broadcasting in multi-rate WMNs is significantly different to broadcasting in single-rate WMNs, and that broadcast performance in multi-rate WMNs can be significantly improved by exploiting the availability of multi-rate feature and multiple interfaces. We also present two alternative MLB broadcast frameworks and specific algorithms, centralized and distributed, for each framework that can exploit multiple interfaces at a WMN node, and the multi-rate feature and WBA of MR$^2$-MC WMN to return improved `broadcast latency' performance.

In the past few years Wireless Mesh Networks (WMNs) have developed as a promising technology to provide flexible and low-cost broadband network services. The Expected Transmission Count (ETX) routing metric has been put forward recently as an advanced routing metric to provide high QoS for static WMNs. Most previous research in this area suggests that ETX outperforms other routing metrics in throughput and efficiency. However, it has been determined that ETX is not immune to load sensitivity and route oscillations in a single radio environment. Route oscillations refer to the situation where packet transmission switches between two or more routes due to congestion. This has the effect of degrading performance of the network, as the routing protocol may select a non optimal path. In this thesis we avoided the route oscillation problem by forcing data transmission on fixed routes. This can be implemented in the AODV (Ad hoc On-demand Distance Vector) protocol by disabling both error messages and periodic updating messages (the HELLO scheme). However, a critical factor for our approach is that ETX must determine a high quality initial route in AODV. This thesis investigates whether the ETX metric improves initial route selection in AODV compared to the HOPS metric in two representative client-server applications: the Traffic Control Network (TCN) and the Video Stream (VS) network. We evaluate the ETX and HOPS metrics in a range of scenarios which possess different link qualities and different traffic loads. We find the ETX metric greatly improves initial route selection in AODV compared to the HOPS in the network in which only single flow exists. For networks in which there are multiple simultaneous flows, ETX behaves similar to HOPS in initial route selection. Based on these results, we find the solution of route stabilization to route oscillations in the context of ETX is only useful in the single flow case. To address this problem, we propose a modified solution of repeatedly broadcasting RREQ (Route Request) packets. Simulation results show that our modified solution allows ETX to be useful in the initial route selection in both single flow and multiple simultaneous flows cases.

This dissertation reports on studies of the application of lexicographic graph searches to solve problems in FPGA detailed routing. Our contributions include the derivation of iteration limits for scalar implementations of negotiation congestion for standard floating point types and the identification of pathological cases for path choice. In the study of the routability-driven detailed FPGA routing problem, we show universal detailed routability is NP-complete based on a related proof by Lee and Wong. We describe the design of a lexicographic composition operator of totally-ordered monoids as path cost metrics and show its optimality under an adapted A* search. Our new router, CornNC, based on lexicographic composition of congestion and wirelength, established a new minimum track count for the FPGA Place and Route Challenge. For the problem of long-path timing-driven FPGA detailed routing, we show that long-path budgeted detailed routability is NP-complete by reduction to universal detailed routability. We generalise the lexicographic composition to any finite length and verify its optimality under A* search. The application of the timing budget solution of Ghiasi et al. is used to solve the long-path timing budget problem for FPGA connections. Our delay-clamped spiral lexicographic composition design, SpiralRoute, ensures connection based budgets are always met, thus achieves timing closure when it successfully routes. For 113 test routing instances derived from standard benchmarks, SpiralRoute found 13 routable instances with timing closure that were unroutable by a scalar negotiated congestion router and achieved timing closure in another 27 cases when the scalar router did not, at the expense of increased runtime. We also study techniques to improve SpiralRoute runtimes, including a data structure of a trie augmented by data stacks for minimum element retrieval, and the technique of step tomonoid elimination in reducing the retrieval depth in a trie of stacks structure.

The ongoing development of new and demanding Internet applications requires the Internet to deliver better service levels that are significantly better than the best effort service that the Internet currently provides and was built for. These improved service levels include guaranteed delays, jitter and bandwidth. Through extensive research into Quality of Service and Differentiated Service (DiffServ) it has become possible to provide guaranteed services, however this turns out to be inadequate without the application of Traffic Engineering methodologies and principles. Traffic Engineering is an integral part of network operation. Its major goal is to deliver the best performance from an existing service provider's network resources and, at the same time, to enhance a customers' view of network performance. In this thesis, several different traffic engineering methods for optimising the operation of native IP and IP networks employing MPLS are proposed. A feature of these new methods is their fast run times and this opens the way to making them suitable for application in an online traffic engineering environment. For native IP networks running shortest path based routing protocols, we show that an LP-based optimisation based on the well known multi-commodity flow problem can be effective in removing network congestion. Having realised that Internet service providers are now moving towards migrating their networks to the use of MPLS, we have also formulated optimisation methods to traffic engineer MPLS networks by selecting suitable routing paths and utilising the feature of explicit routing contained in MPLS. Although MPLS is capable of delivering traffic engineering across different classes of traffic, network operators still prefer to rely on the proven and simple IP based routing protocols for best effort traffic and only use MPLS to route traffic requiring special forwarding treatment. Based on this fact, we propose a method that optimises the routing patterns applicable to different classes of traffic based on their bandwidth requirements. A traffic engineering comparison study that evaluates the performance of a neural network-based method for MPLS networks and LP-based weight setting approach for shortest path based networks has been performed using a well-known open source network simulator, called ns2. The comparative evaluation is based upon the packet loss probability. The final chapter of the thesis describes the software development of a network management application called OptiFlow which integrates techniques described in earlier chapters including the LP-based weight setting optimisation methodology; it also uses traffic matrix estimation techniques that are required as input to the weight setting models that have been devised. The motivation for developing OptiFlow was to provide a prototype set of tools that meet the congestion management needs of networking industries (ISPs and telecommunications companies - telcos).