A Policy–driven Trading Framework for Market–based Spectrum Assignment

We present a policy–driven trading framework for market–based spectrum assignment. Our work allows spectrum consumers to get exclusive access rights through payment of a fee, for a given period of time, and for a given frequency band and location. The key motivation behind our proposal stems from the increased complexity of new spectrum management strategies and the need for extracting the maximum benefit from the available spectrum. In this paper we demonstrate that a policy–driven solution is applicable for the management of spectrum markets, and we present a decentralised and lightweight framework for implementing such markets in networked environments.

An investigation of mobile ad-hoc network performance with cognitive attributes applied

Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks (MANETs) are known for their versatility, which is they are capable of supporting many applications. In addition to this versatility MANETs are quick to deploy without need for an existing predefined communications infrastructure. However, although the lack of infrastructure allows for the quick deployment of the data communications network, it adds many factors that hinder packet delivery. Such hindrances occur because of the dynamic topology caused by the mobility of the nodes which results in link breakages. Routing protocols exist that attempt to refresh available routes; however, this is after link breakages have occurred. The nodes also usually have constrained resources (i.e. energy source and limited bandwidth). This thesis presents a novel approach of network behaviour and management by implementing cognitive attributes into a MANET environment. This allows an application to better meet its mission objectives, decreases the end-to-end delay, and increases packet delivery ratio. The network is able to make observations, consider previous actions and consequences of the actions, and make changes based on the prior knowledge and experience. This work also shows how the network can better utilise limited resources such as bandwidth allocation by applying cognitive attributes. Simulations conducted show promising results and prove that an increase in network performance is possible if adopting a cross-layered approach and allow the network to manage and to ‘think’ for itself. Various simulations were run with various scenarios and results are presented without cognition applied, with partial cognition applied and with full cognition applied. A total of 52 simulations were run and from this the results were compared and contrasted. The analysis shows that cognitive attributes does increase network performance in the majority of applications