Due to the advancement in technology and the increase in the amount of data beingtransferred through wireless channels, many developments in the techniques and speedof data transfer have been observed in the past few decades. The current trend incellular technology is transforming from 4G to 5G. So, to meet future requirements,it is highly necessary to have further improvements in technology like modulationtechniques, Channel access methods, etc. Many top research institutes around the worldare investing heavily in research and development of 5G.Radio waves have been used for a very long time in mobile phone communication,but providers are experimenting with broadcasting on millimeter waves which usehigher frequencies ranging from 6GHz to 300GHz. Data characteristics like power,SNR, interference, etc. need to be evaluated for these high frequencies. As 5G is still ininitial phases of development, there are not many testing tools to check and evaluateits performance. A testbed is a testing tool which is used for conducting rigorous,transparent, and replicable testing, experimenting and evaluating the performance ofthese propagated data at these high frequencies.The thesis work evaluates the implementation structures of the 5G testbed @15GHzand its performance in indoor and outdoor scenarios. It also talks about the methods ofsignal generation through Matlab and it’s transmission at 15GHz using Xilinx FPGAand Analog devices’ FMCOMMS5 transceiver. This data is then transmitted andreceived by patch antennas provided by Ericsson AB. Various techniques were used inorder to improve the signal, like using RF hardware components and software modules.Different channel sounding techniques were used in order to achieve the synchronizationbetween the transmitter and the receiver node in order to measure the properties ofthe channel. All of the experiments were performed by implementing a single-inputsingle-output system (SISO) module of the 5G testbed. This SISO system can be easilytransformed into a multiple-input-multiple-output system (MIMO) by replicating theoriginal SISO system.The result shares some interesting findings on the readiness of the 5G testbed for aiiiivbetter understanding of the future technology. It is concluded that this testbed providessomewhat a reliable platform to test the performance of the 5G technology. / Tack vare teknikutveckling och ökning i mängden data som sänds trådlöst, hardatatakterna ökat enormt under de senaste decennierna. Den senaste trended inomtrådlös kommunikationärövergången från 4G till 5G. För att möte framtida krav,finns det därför behov av ytterligare teknologiutveckling, t ex i modulationstekniker och kanalaccessmetoder. Många forskningsinstitut runt om i världen investerar därför i forskning och utveckling av 5G.Radiovågor har använts under väldigt lång tid för mobil kommunikation, men tillverkare och operatörer experimenterar med sändningar i millimetervågsområdet, som använder högre frekvenser i området från 6GHz till 300GHz. Egenskaper såsom effektdämpning, SNR, interferens, osv, behöver utvärderas för dessa högre frekvenser. Eftersom utvecklingen av 5G fortfarande är i en tidig fas, finns inte så många testverktygtillgängliga för prestandautvärdering. En testbädd är ett testverktyg som användsför att utföra rigorös, transparent och upprepningsbar testning, experimentering och prestandautvärdering av data som har sänts vid dessa höga frekvenser.Denna rapport utvärderar implementationsstrukturer för en 5G-testbädd vid 15GHz,och dess prestanda i inomoch utomhusscenarier. Den beskriver även metoder försignalgenerering via Matlab och sändning vid 15GHz mha Xilinx FPGA och Analog devices’ FMCOMMS5 radiomoduler. Signalen sänds sedan via patch-antenner från Ericsson AB. Olika metoder användes för att förbättra signalen, både med radiofrekvens hårdvara och mjukvarumoduler. Olika kanalmätningsmetoder har använts för att nå synkronisering mellan sändaroch mottagarnoderna, för att mäta kanalegenskaper. Alla experimenten utfördes genom att implementera en SISO-modul (en sändarresp. mottagarantenn) av 5G-testbädden. Detta SISO-system kan enkelt utökas till ett MIMO system (flera sändaroch mottagarantenner) genom att replikera SISO-systemet.Resultaten visar att 5G-testbädden är redo att användas för att nå bättre förståelse av framtida teknologin. Slutsatsen är att testbädden erbjuder en tämligen påliglig plattformför att utvärdera prestanda för 5G-teknologi.

In the field of control systems, testbeds are a pivotal step in the validation and improvement of new algorithms for different applications. They provide a safe, controlled environment typically having a significantly lower cost of failure than the final application. Vision systems provide nonintrusive methods of measurement that can be easily implemented for various setups and applications. This work presents methods for modeling, removing distortion, calibrating, and rectifying single and two camera systems, as well as, two very different applications of vision-based control system testbeds: deflection control of shape memory polymers and trajectory planning for mobile robots. First, a testbed for the modeling and control of shape memory polymers (SMP) is designed. Red-green-blue (RGB) thresholding is used to assist in the webcam-based, 3D reconstruction of points of interest. A PID based controller is designed and shown to work with SMP samples, while state space models were identified from step input responses. Models were used to develop a linear quadratic regulator that is shown to work in simulation. Also, a simple to use graphical interface is designed for fast and simple testing of a series of samples. Second a robot testbed is designed to test new trajectory planning algorithms. A templatebased predictive search algorithm is investigated to process the images obtained through a lowcost webcam vision system, which is used to monitor the testbed environment. Also a userfriendly graphical interface is developed such that the functionalities of the webcam, robots, and optimizations are automated. The testbeds are used to demonstrate a wavefront-enhanced, Bspline augmented virtual motion camouflage algorithm for single or multiple robots to navigate through an obstacle dense and changing environment, while considering inter-vehicle conflicts, iv obstacle avoidance, nonlinear dynamics, and different constraints. In addition, it is expected that this testbed can be used to test different vehicle motion planning and control algorithms.

Modern society places an increasingly high demand on data transmission. Much of that data transmission takes place through communication over the frequency spectrum. The channels on the spectrum are limited resources. Researchers realize that at certain times of day some channels are overloaded, while others are not being fully utilized. A spectrum management system may be beneficial to remedy this efficiency issue. One of the proposed systems, Cognitive Radio Network (CRN), has progressed over the years thanks to studies on a wide range of subjects, including geolocation, data throughput rate, and channel handoff selection algorithm, which provide fundamental support for the spectrum management system. To move CRN technology forward, in this thesis we propose a physical, scalable testbed for some of the extant CRN methodologies. This testbed integrates IEEE standards, FCC guidelines, and other TV band regulations to emulate CRN in real time. With careful component selections, we include sufficient operational functionalities in the system, while at the same time making sure it remains affordable. We evaluate the technical feasibility of the testbed by studying several simple CRN logics. When comparing a system with a selection table implemented to those with naive selection methods, there is more than a 60 percent improvement in the overall performance.

<p dir="ltr">Learning-based systems (LBS) have become essential in various domains, necessitating the development of testing and evaluation (T&E) procedures specifically tailored to address the unique characteristics and challenges of LBS. However, existing frameworks designed for traditional systems do not adequately capture the intricacies of LBS, including their evolving nature, complexity, and susceptibility to adversarial actions. This study advocates for a paradigm shift in T&E, proposing its integration throughout the entire life cycle of LBS, starting from the early stages of development and extending to operations and sustainment. The research objectives focus on exploring innovative approaches for designing LBS-specific T&E strategies, creating an experimental testbed with multi-fidelity modeling capabilities, investigating the optimal degree of test and evaluation required for LBS, and examining the impact of system knowledge access and the delicate balance between T&E activities and data/model rights. These objectives aim to overcome the challenges associated with LBS and contribute to the development of effective testing approaches that assess their capabilities and limitations throughout the life cycle. The proposed experimental testbed will provide a versatile environment for comprehensive testing and evaluation, enabling researchers and practitioners to assess LBS performance across varying levels of complexity. The findings from this study will contribute the development of efficient testing strategies and practical approaches that strike a balance between thorough evaluation and data/model rights. Ultimately, the integration of continuous T&E insights throughout the life cycle of LBS aims to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of capability delivery by enabling adjustments and improvements at each stage.</p>

[EN] Under the view of artificial intelligence, an intelligent agent is an autonomous entity which interacts in an environment through observations and actions, trying to achieve one or more goals with the aid of several signals called rewards. The creation of intelligent agents is proliferating during the last decades, and the evaluation of their intelligence is a fundamental issue for their understanding, construction and improvement. Social intelligence is recently obtaining special attention in the creation of intelligent agents due to the current view of human intelligence as highly social. Social intelligence in natural and artificial systems is usually measured by the evaluation of associated traits or tasks that are deemed to represent some facets of social behaviour. The amalgamation of these traits or tasks is then used to configure an operative notion of social intelligence. However, this operative notion does not truly represent what social intelligence is and a definition following this principle will not be precise. Instead, in this thesis we investigate the evaluation of social intelligence in a more formal and general way, by actually considering the evaluee's interaction with other agents. In this thesis we analyse the implications of evaluating social intelligence using a test that evaluates general intelligence. For this purpose, we include other agents into an initially single-agent environment to figure out the issues that appear when evaluating an agent in the context of other agents. From this analysis we obtain useful information for the evaluation of social intelligence. From the lessons learned, we identify the components that should be considered in order to measure social intelligence, and we provide a formal and parametrised definition of social intelligence. This definition calculates an agent's social intelligence as its expected performance in a set of environments with a set of other agents arranged in teams and participating in line-ups, with rewards being re-understood appropriately. This is conceived as a tool to define social intelligence testbeds where we can generate several degrees of competitive and cooperative behaviours. We test this definition by experimentally analysing the influence of teams and agent line-ups for several multi-agent systems with variants of Q-learning agents. However, not all testbeds are appropriate for the evaluation of social intelligence. To facilitate the analysis of a social intelligence testbed, we provide some formal property models about social intelligence in order to characterise the testbed and thus assess its suitability. Finally, we use the presented properties to characterise some social games and multi-agent environments, we make a comparison between them and discuss their strengths and weaknesses in order to evaluate social intelligence. / [ES] Bajo la visión de la inteligencia artificial, un agente inteligente es una entidad autónoma la cual interactúa en un entorno a través de observaciones y acciones, tratando de lograr uno o más objetivos con la ayuda de varias señales llamadas recompensas. La creación de agentes inteligentes está proliferando durante las últimas décadas, y la evaluación de su inteligencia es un asunto fundamental para su entendimiento, construcción y mejora. Recientemente la inteligencia social está obteniendo especial atención en la creación de agentes inteligentes debido a la visión actual de la inteligencia humana como altamente social. Normalmente la inteligencia social en sistemas naturales y artificiales se mide mediante la evaluación de rasgos asociados o tareas que se consideran que representan algunas facetas del comportamiento social. La agrupación de estos rasgos o tareas se utiliza entonces para configurar una noción operacional de inteligencia social. Sin embargo, esta noción operacional no representa fielmente a la inteligencia social y no sería posible una definición siguiendo este principio. En su lugar, en esta tesis investigamos la evaluación de la inteligencia social de un modo más formal y general, considerando la interacción del agente a evaluar con otros agentes. En esta tesis analizamos las implicaciones de evaluar la inteligencia social utilizando un test que evalúe la inteligencia general. Con este objetivo incluimos otros agentes en un entorno inicialmente diseñado para un único agente con el fin de averiguar qué cuestiones aparecen cuando evaluamos a un agente en un contexto con otros agentes. A partir de este análisis obtenemos información útil para la evaluación de la inteligencia social. A partir de las lecciones aprendidas identificamos los componentes que deberían considerarse al medir la inteligencia social y proporcionamos una definición formal y parametrizada de esta inteligencia social. Esta definición calcula la inteligencia social de un agente como su rendimiento esperado en un conjunto de entornos y con un conjunto de otros agentes organizados en equipos y distribuidos en alineaciones, reinterpretando apropiadamente las recompensas. Esto se concibe como una herramienta para definir bancos de prueba de inteligencia social donde podamos generar varios grados de comportamientos competitivos y cooperativos. Probamos esta definición analizando experimentalmente la influencia de los equipos y las alineaciones de agentes en varios sistemas multiagente con variantes de agentes Q-learning. Sin embargo, no todos los bancos de prueba son apropiados para la evaluación de la inteligencia social. Para facilitar el análisis de un banco de pruebas de inteligencia social, proporcionamos algunos modelos de propiedades formales sobre la inteligencia social con el objetivo de caracterizar el banco de pruebas y así valorar su idoneidad. Finalmente, usamos las propiedades presentadas para caracterizar algunos juegos sociales y entornos multiagente, hacemos una comparación entre ellos y discutimos sus puntos fuertes y débiles para ser usados en la evaluación de la inteligencia social. / [CA] Davall la visió de la intel·ligència artificial, un agent intel·ligent és una entitat autònoma la qual interactua en un entorn a través d'observacions i accions, tractant d'aconseguir un o més objectius amb l'ajuda de diverses senyals anomenades recompenses. La creació d'agents intel·ligents està proliferant durant les últimes dècades, i l'avaluació de la seua intel·ligència és un assumpte fonamental per al seu enteniment, construcció i millora. Recentment la intel·ligència social està obtenint especial atenció en la creació d'agents intel·ligents a causa de la visió actual de la intel·ligència humana com altament social. Normalment la intel·ligència social en sistemes naturals i artificials es mesura per mitjà de l'avaluació de trets associats o tasques que es consideren que representen algunes facetes del comportament social. L'agrupació d'aquests trets o tasques s'utilitza llavors per a configurar una noció operacional d'intel·ligència social. No obstant això, aquesta noció operacional no representa fidelment a la intel·ligència social i no seria possible una definició seguint aquest principi. En el seu lloc, en aquesta tesi investiguem l'avaluació de la intel·ligència social d'una manera més formal i general, considerant la interacció de l'agent a avaluar amb altres agents. En aquesta tesi analitzem les implicacions d'avaluar la intel·ligència social utilitzant un test que avalue la intel·ligència general. Amb aquest objectiu incloem altres agents en un entorn inicialment dissenyat per a un únic agent amb la finalitat d'esbrinar quines qüestions apareixen quan avaluem un agent en un context amb altres agents. A partir d'aquesta anàlisi obtenim informació útil per a l'avaluació de la intel·ligència social. A partir de les lliçons apreses identifiquem els components que haurien de considerar-se al mesurar la intel·ligència social i proporcionem una definició formal i parametrizada d'aquesta intel·ligència social. Aquesta definició calcula la intel·ligència social d'un agent com el seu rendiment esperat en un conjunt d'entorns i amb un conjunt d'altres agents organitzats en equips i distribuïts en alineacions, reinterpretant apropiadament les recompenses. Açò es concep com una ferramenta per a definir bancs de prova d'intel·ligència social on podem generar diversos graus de comportaments competitius i cooperatius. Provem aquesta definició analitzant experimentalment la influència dels equips i les alineacions d'agents en diversos sistemes multiagent amb variants d'agents Q-learning. No obstant això, no tots els bancs de prova són apropiats per a l'avaluació de la intel·ligència social. Per a facilitar l'anàlisi d'un banc de proves d'intel·ligència social, proporcionem alguns models de propietats formals sobre la intel·ligència social amb l'objectiu de caracteritzar el banc de proves i així valorar la seua idoneïtat. Finalment, usem les propietats presentades per a caracteritzar alguns jocs socials i entorns multiagent, fem una comparació entre ells i discutim els seus punts forts i dèbils per a ser usats en l'avaluació de la intel·ligència social. / Insa Cabrera, J. (2016). Towards a Universal Test of Social Intelligence [Tesis doctoral]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/66080

This thesis presents the development of a surveillance testbed using wireless sensors and video cameras for vehicle detection and tracking. The experimental study includes testbed design and discusses some of the implementation issues in using wireless sensors and video cameras for a practical application. A group of sensor devices equipped with light sensors are used to detect and localize the position of moving vehicle. Background subtraction method is used to detect the moving vehicle from the video sequences. Vehicle centroid is calculated in each frame. A non-linear minimization method is used to estimate the perspective transformation which project 3D points to 2D image points. Vehicle location estimates from three cameras are fused to form a single trajectory representing the vehicle motion. Experimental results using both sensors and cameras are presented. Average error between vehicle location estimates from the cameras and the wireless sensors is around 0.5ft.

Funcionalidades de eficiência energética vêm sendo integradas a protocolos e sistemas de gerenciamento de redes. Várias dessas funcionalidades afetam a rede de diferentes modos, acarretando compromissos. Podem afetar a confiabilidade e a disponibilidade da rede ao colocarem equipamentos e enlaces em modo dormente; e podem afetar o tempo de vida dos equipamentos ao alterarem seu modo de utilização. Os resultados da integração dessas funcionalidades à rede podem ser avaliados por emulação, que provê informação sobre como algum mecanismo de roteamento em particular, fruto dessa integração, agiria em diferentes condições de rede. Preparar um ambiente de experimentação que trate das interações entre diferentes funções da rede, considerando as funcionalidades de eficiência energética, traz alguns desafios. Uma combinação de emulação e implementação das principais funcionalidades de eficiência energética provê uma visão mais próxima sobre o que pode ocorrer em implantações reais de sistemas de gerenciamento energeticamente eficiente. Esta dissertação discute (i) como se avaliarem os compromissos existentes no emprego de técnicas de eficiência energética, mostrando também como o tempo de vida de equipamentos pode ser alterado e como a confiabilidade e disponibilidade da rede podem ser degradadas, e discute (ii) requisitos para o desenvolvimento de um ambiente de experimentação para avaliação de tais técnicas. O ambiente é baseado em roteadores implementados por software, para emulação de funcionalidades ainda não disponíveis, mas desejadas, de equipamentos de rede. Após a experimentação do protótipo de um sistema de gerenciamento de redes orientado por política de eficiência energética, aplicam-se os métodos de avaliação dos compromissos ocasionados por este sistema. / Energy efficiency features are being integrated in network protocols and management systems. Many of such features affect the network in different ways, thus yielding tradeoffs. They can affect the reliability and availability of the network when they put devices or links into sleep mode, and they can affect the lifetime of the devices as a result of the new operating pattern. The effects of integrating these features to the network can be assessed through emulation, which can provide insight on how a particular routing mechanism would perform in different network conditions. In addition, building an experimentation environment that is able to comprehensively account for interactions between different network functions taking into account energy efficiency features is challenging. A combination of emulation and implementation of major energy efficiency features provides a view closer to what may happen in a real deployment of energy-efficient management systems. This dissertation discusses (i) how to evaluate the tradeoffs existing between the use of energy-efficiency techniques and the lifetime of devices and with the reliability and availability of the network, and (ii) requirements for the development of a testbed to evaluate such techniques. The testbed is based on software routers, so to emulate future and desired network equipment functionalities. After experiments with the prototype of a sustainability-oriented network management system based on policies, an evaluation about the tradeoffs brought by such system to the network is performed.

Submitted by Luciclea Silva (luci@ufpa.br) on 2018-06-12T14:48:14Z No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) Dissertacao_Multi-tierfogarchitecture.pdf: 1995624 bytes, checksum: d87887746c56923151f9613fa98af2b1 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Luciclea Silva (luci@ufpa.br) on 2018-06-12T14:49:33Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) Dissertacao_Multi-tierfogarchitecture.pdf: 1995624 bytes, checksum: d87887746c56923151f9613fa98af2b1 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-06-12T14:49:33Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 0 bytes, checksum: d41d8cd98f00b204e9800998ecf8427e (MD5) Dissertacao_Multi-tierfogarchitecture.pdf: 1995624 bytes, checksum: d87887746c56923151f9613fa98af2b1 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-03-05 / Os usuários estão mudando seus hábitos de comunicação tradicional com base em chamadas de voz ou mensagens de texto para serviços de vídeo em tempo real ou sob demanda consumidos em dispositivos móveis. Nesse sentido, a transmissão de conteúdo de vídeo considerando uma Qualidade de Experência (QoE) adequada nas infraestruturas de redes sem fio móvel é um problema crítico nas comunidades acadêmicas e industriais. Além disso, o vídeo sob demanda tem um consumo crescente na Internet, exigindo maior largura de banda e menor latência. Neste contexto, um paradigma de computação em névoa pode ser aplicado para melhorar a experiência do usuário em redes sem fio. A computação em névoa pode melhorar a QoE para transmissão de vídeo sob demanda, tanto fazendo cache de vídeo quanto fazendo adaptação de conteúdo na borda da rede. No entanto, é importante avaliar o desempenho do download de vídeos com diferentes configurações de codec e em cache mais próximo do usuário para medir o ganho sob perspectiva do usuário. Projetamos uma arquitetura de computação em névoa de várias camadas com 3 níveis localizados na nuvem, um perto da borda e outra nos dispositivos m´oveis. Avaliamos o desempenho do download do vídeo de vários níveis localizados em aplicações geográficas distintas para aplicações multimídia. N´os avaliamos em um ambiente experimental com rede livre e congestionada de vídeos transmitidos codificados em H.264 e H.265 com 3 taxas de bits em um cenário implantado no testbed FIBRE. Nós coletamos métricas de QoE, tempo de inicial para reprodução, tempo de congelamento, métricas de QoS, tempo de viagem ida e volta do pacote e consumo de energia para analisar os ganhos para cada configuração de vídeo. Esses resultados mostraram uma compreensão importante do uso de cache , codec e taxa de bits em cenários de redes multimídia. / Users are changing their traditional communication paradigm based on voice calls or text messages to real-time or on demand video services consumed on mobile devices. In this sense, the transmission of video content considering an adequate Quality of Experience (QoE) in mobile wireless networking infrastructures is a critical issue in both academic and industrial communities. Furthermore, video on demand have a growing consumption over Internet requiring higher bandwidth and lower latency. In this context, a fog computing paradigm can enhance the user experience in wireless networks. Fog computing for video on demand streaming can improve QoE by both video caching and adaptation schemes. However, it is important to evaluate the performance of downloading the videos with different codec configuration and cached closer to the user to measure the gain from the user perspective. We designed a multi-tier fog computing architecture with three levels located in the cloud, nearer the edge and in mobile devices. We evaluated the performance of downloading the video from multiple tier located in distinct geographical with a multimedia application. We assessed in an experimental environment with idle and congested network of streamed videos coded into H.264 and H.265 with three bitrates in a scenario deployed in the FIBRE testbed. We collected QoE metrics, playback start time, freeze times, QoS metric, round-time trip, and energy consumption to analyze the gains for each video configuration. These results showed an important understanding about cache, codec and bitrate schemes in multimedia networking scenarios.

Funcionalidades de eficiência energética vêm sendo integradas a protocolos e sistemas de gerenciamento de redes. Várias dessas funcionalidades afetam a rede de diferentes modos, acarretando compromissos. Podem afetar a confiabilidade e a disponibilidade da rede ao colocarem equipamentos e enlaces em modo dormente; e podem afetar o tempo de vida dos equipamentos ao alterarem seu modo de utilização. Os resultados da integração dessas funcionalidades à rede podem ser avaliados por emulação, que provê informação sobre como algum mecanismo de roteamento em particular, fruto dessa integração, agiria em diferentes condições de rede. Preparar um ambiente de experimentação que trate das interações entre diferentes funções da rede, considerando as funcionalidades de eficiência energética, traz alguns desafios. Uma combinação de emulação e implementação das principais funcionalidades de eficiência energética provê uma visão mais próxima sobre o que pode ocorrer em implantações reais de sistemas de gerenciamento energeticamente eficiente. Esta dissertação discute (i) como se avaliarem os compromissos existentes no emprego de técnicas de eficiência energética, mostrando também como o tempo de vida de equipamentos pode ser alterado e como a confiabilidade e disponibilidade da rede podem ser degradadas, e discute (ii) requisitos para o desenvolvimento de um ambiente de experimentação para avaliação de tais técnicas. O ambiente é baseado em roteadores implementados por software, para emulação de funcionalidades ainda não disponíveis, mas desejadas, de equipamentos de rede. Após a experimentação do protótipo de um sistema de gerenciamento de redes orientado por política de eficiência energética, aplicam-se os métodos de avaliação dos compromissos ocasionados por este sistema. / Energy efficiency features are being integrated in network protocols and management systems. Many of such features affect the network in different ways, thus yielding tradeoffs. They can affect the reliability and availability of the network when they put devices or links into sleep mode, and they can affect the lifetime of the devices as a result of the new operating pattern. The effects of integrating these features to the network can be assessed through emulation, which can provide insight on how a particular routing mechanism would perform in different network conditions. In addition, building an experimentation environment that is able to comprehensively account for interactions between different network functions taking into account energy efficiency features is challenging. A combination of emulation and implementation of major energy efficiency features provides a view closer to what may happen in a real deployment of energy-efficient management systems. This dissertation discusses (i) how to evaluate the tradeoffs existing between the use of energy-efficiency techniques and the lifetime of devices and with the reliability and availability of the network, and (ii) requirements for the development of a testbed to evaluate such techniques. The testbed is based on software routers, so to emulate future and desired network equipment functionalities. After experiments with the prototype of a sustainability-oriented network management system based on policies, an evaluation about the tradeoffs brought by such system to the network is performed.

<p>This thesis is concerned with the use of multiple antenna elements in wireless communication over frequency non-selective radio channels. Both measurement results and theoretical analysis are presented. New transmit strategies are derived and compared to existing transmit strategies, such as beamforming and space-time block coding (STBC). It is found that the best transmission algorithm is largely dependent on the channel characteristics, such as the number of transmit and receive antennas and the existence of a line of sight component. Rayleigh fading multiple input multiple output (MIMO) channels are studied using an eigenvalue analysis and exact expressions for the bit error rates and outage capacities for beamforming and STBC is found. In general are MIMO fading channels correlated and there exists a mutual coupling between antenna elements. These findings are supported by indoor MIMO measurements. It is found that the mutual coupling can, in some scenarios, increase the outage capacity. An adaptive antenna testbed is used to obtain measurement results for the single input multiple output (SIMO) channel. The results are analyzed and design guidelines are obtained for how a beamformer implemented in hardware shall be constructed. The effects of nonlinear transmit amplifiers in array antennas are also analyzed, and it is shown that an array reduces the effective intermodulation distortion (IMD) transmitted by the array antenna by a spatial filtering of the IMD. A novel frequency allocation algorithm is proposed that reduces IMD even further. The use of a low cost antenna with switchable directional properties, the switched parasitic antenna, is studied in a MIMO context and compared to array techniques. It is found that it has comparable performance, at a fraction of the cost for an array antenna.</p>