Resource Management in Converged Optical and Millimeter Wave Radio Networks: A Review

Three convergent processes are likely to shape the future of the internet beyond-5G: The convergence of optical and millimeter wave radio networks to boost mobile internet capacity, the convergence of machine learning solutions and communication technologies, and the convergence of virtualized and programmable network management mechanisms towards fully integrated autonomic network resource management. The integration of network virtualization technologies creates the incentive to customize and dynamically manage the resources of a network, making network functions, and storage capabilities at the edge key resources similar to the available bandwidth in network communication channels. Aiming to understand the relationship between resource management, virtualization, and the dense 5G access and fronthaul with an emphasis on converged radio and optical communications, this article presents a review of how resource management solutions have dealt with optimizing millimeter wave radio and optical resources from an autonomic network management perspective. A research agenda is also proposed by identifying current state-of-the-art solutions and the need to shift all the convergent issues towards building an advanced resource management mechanism for beyond-5G

Improving energy efficiency and quality of service in an integrated wireless-optical broadband access network

Exponential growth in the volume of wireless data, boosted by the growing popularity of mobile devices such as smart phones and tablets, is forcing telecommunication industries to rethink network design, and focus on developing high capacity mobile broadband networks. Accordingly, researchers have undertaken developmental work for an integrated wireless-optical broadband access network (WOBAN). Passive optical networks (PONs) and fourth generation (4G) wireless networks are two major candidate technologies for the WOBAN. PON is a wired access technology, well-known for its high capacity, whereas 4G is a wireless broadband access technology, popular for its ease of deployment and ability to offer mobility. Integration of PON and 4G technologies, as a wireless-optical broadband access network, offers advantages such as extension of networks in rural areas, support for mobile broadband services, and rapid deployment of broadband networks. However, these two technologies have different design architectures for handling broadband services which require Quality of Service (QoS), for example, 4G networks use traffic classification for supporting different QoS demands whereas PON does not differentiate between traffic types. This integrated network must also be energy efficient, as a green broadband access network, without hindering QoS. While these technologies both use sleep mode, they differ in their power saving mechanisms. This thesis first addresses a QoS solution for the incompatibility between these technologies. Service class mapping is proposed in Chapter 3 for the integrated WOBAN, based on the M/G/1 queuing model supported by an innovative priority scheduler. Once class mapping is deployed, a power saving mechanism can be devised by exploiting traffic differentiation. Specifically, a class-based strategy is proposed which helps optimise the sleep period for the terminal units of the optical network, without compromising QoS. Since the optical network involves control and terminal nodes, both of which consume power, this thesis proposes an energy efficient mechanism that involves both components. In contrast, other published strategies (Chapter 2) have only considered the terminal units. Chapter 4 presents the mechanism for enabling global sleep (control and terminal nodes) and local sleep (terminal nodes), based on the available traffic\u27s class structure. This mechanism enables sleep for different components within the bandwidth allocation by adapting the switching between predefined polling cycle lengths. As the WOBAN is comprised of both wireless and optical parts, a dynamic resource management mechanism is needed which responds to changing daily traffic patterns across a green integrated network. Consequently, Chapter 5 proposes a mechanism which dynamically adapts the polling cycles, of the optical and wireless parts of the network, to the changing traffic volume and class composition. Tailored sleep durations for the components of the WOBAN are facilitated within the resource management regime, as these components differ in their ability to function efficiently if management of the sleep periods is not responsive to the changing traffic volumes and class composition. This dissertation creates new knowledge by seamlessly integrating the two parts of WOBAN and introducing differentiated, class-based sleep for the components of the hybrid network to help realise a green WOBAN

Deliverable JRA1.1: Evaluation of current network control and management planes for multi-domain network infrastructure

This deliverable includes a compilation and evaluation of available control and management architectures and protocols applicable to a multilayer infrastructure in a multi-domain Virtual Network environment.The scope of this deliverable is mainly focused on the virtualisation of the resources within a network and at processing nodes. The virtualization of the FEDERICA infrastructure allows the provisioning of its available resources to users by means of FEDERICA slices. A slice is seen by the user as a real physical network under his/her domain, however it maps to a logical partition (a virtual instance) of the physical FEDERICA resources. A slice is built to exhibit to the highest degree all the principles applicable to a physical network (isolation, reproducibility, manageability, ...). Currently, there are no standard definitions available for network virtualization or its associated architectures. Therefore, this deliverable proposes the Virtual Network layer architecture and evaluates a set of Management- and Control Planes that can be used for the partitioning and virtualization of the FEDERICA network resources. This evaluation has been performed taking into account an initial set of FEDERICA requirements; a possible extension of the selected tools will be evaluated in future deliverables. The studies described in this deliverable define the virtual architecture of the FEDERICA infrastructure. During this activity, the need has been recognised to establish a new set of basic definitions (taxonomy) for the building blocks that compose the so-called slice, i.e. the virtual network instantiation (which is virtual with regard to the abstracted view made of the building blocks of the FEDERICA infrastructure) and its architectural plane representation. These definitions will be established as a common nomenclature for the FEDERICA project. Other important aspects when defining a new architecture are the user requirements. It is crucial that the resulting architecture fits the demands that users may have. Since this deliverable has been produced at the same time as the contact process with users, made by the project activities related to the Use Case definitions, JRA1 has proposed a set of basic Use Cases to be considered as starting point for its internal studies. When researchers want to experiment with their developments, they need not only network resources on their slices, but also a slice of the processing resources. These processing slice resources are understood as virtual machine instances that users can use to make them behave as software routers or end nodes, on which to download the software protocols or applications they have produced and want to assess in a realistic environment. Hence, this deliverable also studies the APIs of several virtual machine management software products in order to identify which best suits FEDERICA’s needs.Postprint (published version