Physical constrains of integrated circuits (commonly called chip) in regards to size and finite number of wires, has made the design of System-on-Chip (SoC) more interesting to study in terms of finding better solutions for the complexity of the chip-interconnections. The SoC has hundreds of Processing Elements (PEs), and a single shared bus can no longer be acceptable due to poor scalability with the system size. Networks on Chip (NoC) have been proposed as a solution to mitigate complex on-chip communication problems for complex SoCs. They consists of computational resources in the form of PE cores and switching nodes which allow PEs to communicate with each other. In the design and development of Networks on Chip, performance modelling and analysis has great theoretical and practical importance. This research is devoted to developing efficient and cost-effective analytical tools for the performance analysis and enhancement of NoCs with m-port n-tree topology under bursty traffic. Recent measurement studies have strongly verified that the traffic generated by many real-world applications in communication networks exhibits bursty and self-similar properties in nature and the message destinations are uniformly distributed. NoC's performance is generally affected by different traffic patterns generated by the processing elements. As the first step in the research, a new analytical model is developed to capture the burstiness and self-similarity characteristics of the traffic within NoCs through the use of Markov Modulated Poisson Process. The performance results of the developed model highlight the importance of accurate traffic modelling in the study and performance evaluation of NoCs. Having developed an efficient analytical tool to capture the traffic behaviour with a higher accuracy, in the next step, the research focuses on the effect of topology on the performance of NoCs. Many important challenges still remain as vulnerabilities within the design of NoCs with topology being the most important. Therefore a new analytical model is developed to investigate the performance of NoCs with the m-port n-tree topology under bursty traffic. Even though it is broadly proved in practice that fat-tree topology and its varieties result in lower latency, higher throughput and bandwidth, still most studies on NoCs adopt Mesh, Torus and Spidergon topologies. The results gained from the developed model and advanced simulation experiments significantly show the effect of fat-tree topology in reducing latency and increasing the throughput of NoCs. In order to obtain deeper understanding of NoCs performance attributes and for further improvement, in the final stage of the research, the developed analytical model was extended to consider the use of virtual channels within the architecture of NoCs. Extensive simulation experiments were carried out which show satisfactory improvements in the throughput of NoCs with fat-tree topology and VCs under bursty traffic. The analytical results and those obtained from extensive simulation experiments have shown a good degree of accuracy for predicting the network performance under different design alternatives and various traffic conditions.

Similar to cancer cells, HIV-infected cells differ from HIV-uninfected cells in that they have altered interferon signaling pathways, the apparent reason for the selectivity of certain oncolytic viruses (OVs). Therefore, it was hypothesized that use of an OV, such as recombinant Maraba virus (MG1), may be a potential approach to eliminate latently-infected cells constituting the HIV reservoir while sparing HIV-uninfected cells. This was studied in U1, ACH-2, OM-10 and J1.1 cells and their respective HIV-uninfected parent cell lines in addition to CD4+CD25-HLADR- cells from HIV-infected individuals on effective antiretroviral therapy. Although MG1 infected and killed latently HIV-infected U1 cells to a greater degree than the HIV-uninfected parent U937 cells, this was not observed in the other HIV-infected cell lines and their respective parent cell lines. Furthermore, results from primary cells suggest that MG1 alone does not appear to eliminate cells which comprise the major HIV reservoir. Challenges of studying the HIV reservoir and priorities for future studies examining the use of OVs as a potential strategy to eliminate the HIV reservoir are discussed.

Security is a key challenge for any IIoT network and more so for constrained IWSN deployments. Novel methods are thus required to enhance security, taking into consideration the lossy and low power nature of the IWSN. The use of ICMP packets is proposed as a method to generate fingerprinting information for IWSN devices. The ICMP based method uses the round-trip time information in the ICMP header as a fingerprinting metric. The results showed that the effect of the physical layer can be averaged out of the measurement if enough samples are available. A linear relationship was found between hop count and round-trip time for a static network which can be used in the design phase of the IWSN network or alternatively as a method to fingerprint routing anomalies in real-time. The ICMP method was able to differentiate between devices from different vendors, but unable to fingerprint devices from the same vendor due to physical layer interference. The work shows that fingerprinting in an IWSN using the ICMP method is possible if the timing delta under investigation is an order of magnitude larger than the timing variation introduced by the physical layer while maintaining a reasonable signal-to-noise ratio. / Dissertation (MEng (Computer Engineering))--University of Pretoria, 2021. / Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering / MEng (Computer Engineering) / Unrestricted

The diploma thesis is focusing on middleware layer in distributed systems. It introduces typically used communication protocols and standards operating on this layer. In theoretical part it brings closer look at OMG DDS specification. This part contains fundamental functionalities of this specification along with its architecture blocks. Thesis also describes the RTPS protocol functionality. Existing implementations of OMG DDS standard are described at the end of theoretical part. OpenDDS 3.13 implementation is used in practical part of thesis. It is deployed and tested on various platforms. Next part verifies option of securing RTPS data stream using beta version of OMG DDS Security, which OpenDDS 3.13 implementation contains. Secured and unsecured data flows are being compared. Latency of data stream is also important, especially in distributed systems. DDS system, which measures latency of RTPS stream is created in practical part. Latency of this DDS system can be measured in various configurations. Difference of devices’ performance used in measurements can be clearly seen in latency results where the size of data samples is increasing. Differences of measured latency are also recognizable between reliable and unreliable and secure and unsecure RTPS stream. Part of measurements is made between 2 physical devices with and without an attacker. Type of attack is MITM and it captures RTPS flow, which does not belong to attacking machine.

This study aimed to examine transport layer API:s for the game development software Unity, and conclude its effect on latency. This effect was examined by conducting a controlled experiment, whereas three transport layer API:s, KCP, Telepathy, and Steamworks.NET were active on three different open-source Unity online games. The underlying network infrastructure Mirror was integrated to utilize each transport layer API, which also provided the components necessary to capture latency at runtime. In a second unstable connection experiment, the packet loss rate of 30% was configured to analyze the transport layer API:s performance during a poor connection. Although previous work has analyzed Mirror, the corresponding transport layer API within Mirror, and its effect on latency, have not been researched. The results suggest that Steamworks.NET achieves a significantly increased latency compared to KCP and Telepathy, though Telepathy only significantly increases from KCP under unstable network conditions.

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This thesis project was sponsored by Terraplay System AB. Terraplay System is a wireless online multiplayer game service provider in Europe. The purpose of this project was to provide a convenient and free latency test tool named Terraplay Test Toolkit (TTK) for game developers who utilize the Terraplay platform. Since wireless multiplayer games are latency sensitive, it’s necessary for game developers to estimate the real-time game latency before their development. TTK is based on Java Mobile Edition (J2me) technology, it can performs a real-time Round Trip Time (RTT) latency test. This project explored the application of the mobile development. Mobile development is a brand new field and becoming more and more popular. The design process and source code can be used as reference for mobile developers. Based on the Terraplay Test Toolkit, a series of experiments were conducted to test the ability of TTK. These experiments focused on end-to-end latency effects of wireless multiplayer games under different situations such as different packet size, different sending rates, high speed movement, and so on. Although TTK is not a professional test tool, it still reflects the latency variance under different conditions correctly. From these experiments, it was found that for the Terraplay enabled wireless multiplayer games, large average packet size (300 bytes) is NOT a factor with regard to the latency on the Terraplay System; the packet rate can affect the game latency. In a high speed-moving environment, game latency doesn’t obvious increase. Using HTTP can cause three times higher latency than simply using TCP. These conclusions are based on experimental results. These conclusions should guide wireless multiplayer game developers and game players. / Denna avhandling är sponsrad av Terraplay System AB. Terraplay System är en trådlös multiplayer-spelservice i Sverige. Syftet med detta projekt var att ge ett lättillgängligt och gratis testverktyg för fördröjning kallat Terraplay Test Toolkit (TTK) till spelutvecklare som använder Terraplays plattform. Eftersom trådlösa multispel är känsliga för fördröjning, är det nödvändigt för spelutvecklare att innan de börjar göra en uppskattning av denna. TTK är baserat på Java Mobile Edition-teknologi (J2me), och kan utföra ett fördröjningstest i realtid, kallat Round Trip Time (RTT). Detta projekt undersökte tillämpningen av den mobila utvecklingen. Mobil utveckling är ett helt nytt fält och blir mer och mer populärt. Designprocessen och källkoden kan användas som referenser för mobila utvecklare. Baserat på Terraplay Test Toolkit gjordes en serie experiment för att testa TTK:s förmåga. Dessa experiment fokuserade på fördröjda effekter av trådlösa multiplayerspel under olika situationer så som olika paketstorlek, olika leveranshastigheter, höghastighetsrörelser och så vidare. Även fast TTK inte är ett professionellt testverktyg, och inte kan användas för exakta fördröjningsanalyser, återger det ändå fördröjningens variationer under olika villkor. Dessa experiment visade att trådlösa multiplayerspel anpassade till Terraplay, med genomsnittlig paketstorlek (300 bite) INTE är en faktor med avseende på fördröjningen till Terraplay System; paketets hastighet kan påverka paketets fördröjning. I en miljö med hög rörelsehastighet, ökar inte påtagligt spelets fördröjning. Användandet av HTTP kan orsaka en tre gånger så lång fördröjning, jämfört med att bara använda TCP. Slutsatserna är baserade på experimentresultaten. Dessa slutsatser kan hjälpa utvecklare av trådlösa multiplayerspel[.]

n-Hexane and its metabolites are neurotoxic to animals and man. Studies have revealed a progressive neuropathy which affects the distal regions of motor and sensory peripheral nerves. This paper describes efforts to determine whether 2-hexanone or 2,5-hexanedione is more neurotoxic to rats when given in drinking water. Our results show that 2,5-hexanedione is more neurotoxic than 2-hexanone and that it first affects the distal axon. Concentrations of 20 mM produced no effects after 3 weeks but 40 mM increased distal latency after 2 weeks.

Human Immunodeficiency Virus 1 (HIV-1) is a lentivirus that forms persistent latently infected reservoirs that are the remaining major hurdle for current HIV-1 treatments. APOBEC3 (A3) proteins are intrinsic retroviral restriction factors that introduce GA mutations during reverse transcription, while Reverse Transcriptase (RT) introduces on average 2-3 mutations every reverse transcription cycle due to a lack of proofreading ability. The goal of this research is to characterize the infectivity and activation of mutated HIV-1 viruses that display reduced transcription upon infection, viruses that we term latency prone viruses (LPVs). We hypothesize that GA transition mutations in the HIV-1 Long Terminal Repeat (LTR) region of the LPVs introduced through Reverse Transcriptase and low levels of A3 protein activity can create HIV-1 sequences that display a reversible, latency-like phenotype. Variable levels of transcription and promoter activation were seen among the LPVs when tested against four classes of Latency Reversing Agents (LRAs). Subsequently, three tested LPVs demonstrated an initial latency-like phenotype before rebounding in infectivity. This project demonstrates for the first time that HIV-1 latency is not simply a byproduct of the infection timing and cellular conditions, but that replication-competent HIV-1 latent viruses can also be created through sublethal mutagenesis of their viral promoter sequence introduced through A3 and RT exposure. The characterization of the complete mechanism of HIV-1 latency induction, maintenance, and reversal is critical in the development of sterilizing and functional cures for HIV-1 infection.

Au cours de ces dernières années, les services Internet croissent considérablement ce qui crée beaucoup de nouveaux défis dans des scénarios variés. La performance globale du service dépend à son tour de la performance des multiples segments de réseau. Nous étudions deux défis représentatifs de conception dans différents segments : les deux les plus importants se trouvent sur les bords opposés la connectivité de bout en bout des chemins d’Internet, notamment, le réseau d’accès pour l’ utilisateur et le réseau de centre de données du fournisseur de services. / In the recent years, the innovation of new services over Internet is considerably growing at a fast speed, which brings forward lots of new challenges under varied scenarios. The overall service performance depends in turn on the performance of multiple network segments. We investigated two representative design challenges in different segments : the two most important sit at the opposite edges of the end-to-end Internet path, namely, the end-user access network vs. the service provider data center network.