Future networks will be different from what an engineer would think today. I’m an engineer and I’ve experienced ways to design, to optimize and to manage network resources in order to guarantee QoS. But imagine plenty of tiny smart nodes, devices and objects interconnected by network of networks thus weaving themselves into the fabric of everyday life to provide any sort of services. Imagine plenty of viral networks at the edge where collective behaviors emerge from the interaction of large numbers of such nodes adopting very simple local rules.

Viruses behaviors to inspire Viral Networking

Edge networks will become robust by definition, but potentially subject to state transitions and the traditional end-to-end QoS issues will assume other perspectives: the network arena will be transformed into dynamic games of many (also new) Players, not only Telcos. Networks dynamics will be governed by the mathematics of “Chaos”: different cooperation-competition strategies can be take place as interactions of states attractors, or even better, basins of attractions in a network phase space. By the way, this an image that can be applied also to the neuron networks in a brain: huge amout of entities, embedding communication, storage and processing capabilities, interacting with each other with simple rules. Then, it is like in Nature, at least metaphorically: no central control, but evolution, is managing complex networks. But evolution normally takes a long time. On the other hand, we have technologies which allows us mimiking a dramatic acceleration of the time variable, and markets will make the natural selection of the best viral solutions.

At the end, it will be possible by tuning very simple autonomic rules of plenty of nodes to guide the network dinamics according to predefined goals and strategies. The degree of “autonomicity” of such viral nodes will provide the basis for the concept of controlled self-organization.

This set of simple rules (mimiking their nervous system) of tiny smart nodes, devices and objects represents a sort of “link” between (generalised) sensors and actuators. Each node, through sensors, perceives its environment, detects the existence of other goals and, through actuators, put in place the required actions. Another similar way to see it is a reflexive coevolution of behavior and structure, which is typical of what they call adaptive networks (e.g. the Web).

In a recent post we’ve elaborated about the challenges of understanding analogies between neurons networks and future networks in order to exploit some of the principles of nervous system functioning. An ideal scenario is viral networks at the edge, where, in the future, a huge number of small self-adaptive nodes (enactive nodes) will be able to create dynamic networks (of processing and storage resources) expanding and contracting over time. Each node will be able to perceive its environment and  to self-adapt dynamically cooperating and competing (in sharing functions and resources) with all the neighbor nodes as in “games”.

How can we embed a sort of “nervous system” in such simple nodes?

We wish to go beyond the traditional concept of neural networks to increase the level of flexibility and learning features.

Imagine such node’s nervous system as a dynamical system with a certain number (theoretically the higher the better) of dimensions so that mathematically it can be treated as a field, a continuous space where the nervous activity takes place. This is the basic idea of Dynamic Neural Fields (DNFs). This is an example of equation modeling it.

Example of equation of a DNF

DNFs have amazing applications in the fields of A.I. and Robotics. As an example, have a look at this recent paper:

 http://www.uni-ulm.de/fileadmin/website_uni_ulm/iui.inst.130/Mitarbeiter/oubbati/Publications/OubbatiICANN11.pdf

 Researchers have modeled the flocking behavior of a number of entities (e.g. agents) through DNFs. Simulations have shown the emergence of a synchronized motion of the group even without a leader; entities’ behaviors have been first transformed to separate stimuli entries of DNFs, and then combined in a global stimulus by assigning a situation-based priority to each behavior (remember the loops of F. Varela). In this case, the simulations have demonstrated the feasibility of the DNFs approach to simulate an emergent flocking behavior. Now they are planning a real-world implementation for a swarm of robots.

 In one sentence, DNFs represent an example of a nervous system-like “missing link” between sensors and actuators. I see potential applications of this avenue of research not only in A.I., robotics but also in future networks at the edge. Certain levels of cognition can be embodied (with DNFs-like approaches) into enactive nodes (as introduced in a former post) to create, dynamically, viral self-adapting networks of networks.

Viral network contracts and expands depending on their environment

The progressive embedding of intelligence (communications, sensors and processing) inside multitude of objects is creating networks through semi-spontaneous aggregation of objects, each one becoming a network node.

Each node perceives its environment, detects the existence of other objects and connects with them in a dynamical fashion, that is keeping ready for any disconnection and new connection as nodes fade away beyond reach and new objects come into its communication range. The functionality of each node is negotiated, again in a dynamic way, with all the neighbor nodes and the whole becomes a network that expand and contract over time.

VIRAL NETWORKS

❏    Internet as a Network of Networks will further grow and most of this growth will occur at the edges whilst the “inner networks”, covering large areas and across the globe, will tend to decrease in number (owners’ number). The networks at the edges will be created by a variety of entities and will number in the billions. Most of them will be BAN (Body Area Networks), PAN (Personal Area Networks), AAN (Ambient Area Networks), VAN (Vehicular Area Networks)  and Sensors Networks.

❏These will aggregate into larger local area networks that spontaneously aggregates in even larger networks to create Viral Networks that are not characterized by any ownership domain.

❏    The commoditization of the big networks will support the evolution towards virtual networks at the edges since there will be very little economic incentive from a Network Operator point of view to cover the last meter and the last inch. These will be covered by new players as an extension of their products (in the consumer electronics, vehicular industry and health care area predominantly).

❏    Many terminals will be able to create a surrounding network and this will connect with overlapping networks effectively providing coverage over large areas.

❏    Future viral networks will be pervasive and this makes the design and control highly complex. These new challenges are at the intersection between non-linear dynamics and statistical thermodynamics, a place which is under the spot even today for gaining more detailed insight into neural-mechanistic events and processes of the brain. For example this will bring to the development of network and service architectures capable of generating feedback loops connecting multi levels of self-organization.

This evolution will bring within COMSOC audience new professionals, like civil engineers, medical doctors, shop designers, but also private citizens and this can significantly expand COMSOC potential audience but at the same time may require a different way to relate with them.

• Need to address different constituencies and to talk to them in terms of application domain rather than technology domain.
• Terminals are crucial in this area. See also 4.4.
• A different approach to standardization may be required.

I have been asked to outline, in 250 words, my views on telecommunications in 2041. Here they are for you to comment!

Thirty years is too long a period to think linearly. In 1981 there was basically no cell phones, now there are close to 5 billions of them.

Everything, information, living being, objects, is part of a connectivity fabric

Electronics will no longer be the leading technology, although almost everything will embed some electronics. By the middle of the next decade the Moore’s law will no longer be sustained by silicon but optics and bio will ensure its validity. Connectivity will bring on line so many devices (and living things, from algae to humans) that the sheer number of connected points will exceed the thresholds on manageability using today’s paradigm. More than that. Most of these “points” will behave as connection nodes, each creating a connectivity space that by overlapping with nearby ones will result in a pervasive self sustained fabric.
This will have changed the rules of the game, in terms of regulatory framework and players. From a technical point of view, it will have revolutionized our ideas of network architectures.
Calling it a connectivity fabric can be misleading. It will be both connectivity, processing and data, more like a brain then like today’s networks where we can make a clear separation among the three of them. Autonomics will rule at the local level and the whole will behave like a dynamically changing ecosystem around stability points minimizing energy consumption.
This fabric, being formed by objects (including living ones), will change the way we look at objects, at enterprises and processes. Objects are communicating entities and players in the ecosystem. Services are likely to become ecosystem states and their contextualization becomes a direct fall out of objects being nodes affecting and being affected by the whole.
Get ready for this holistic perception of your world.

Hackers at work to create an infrastructure-less network

In this blog we have sometime mentioned the idea that networks in the future may also comprise parts where the communications infrastructure is generated by terminals.

Hence, it was not a surprise reading the article on Spectrum announcing an initiative to do just that.

“The Open Technology Initiative—part of the public-policy think tank New America Foundation—recently received a US $2 million grant from the Department of State to help coordinate its MANET development effort, called Commotion Wireless. The organization’s goal is to get MANET technology ready for use in areas that have oppressive regimes. The project should be completed by the end of next year, according to Sascha Meinrath, the initiative’s director. While Commotion has only four full-time team members, it relies on some programming (some of which it pays for) from the open-source community. “For us, this is about a call to action,” Meinrath says.”

Take a look at the paper, it really makes you think about the possibilities opened up by the embedding of more and more electronics in objects. We are planning to specifically study this issue at the Future Centre and to look at possible options on the Telco side, so stay tuned.

Radiowaves are precious because only a fraction of them are effective in mobile communications. On the one hand you cannot move around carrying a big antenna, as it would be required to receive waves below 600MHz (the television area) and on the other hand you cannot go to high in frequency since obstacles would absorb the waves (including raindrops). This spectrum limitation is furthermore sliced to different usages: the result is that a single usage has very little spectrum available (up to some hundreds of MHz in the very best scenario).

Progress in electronics and the possibility to dynamically change the reception/transmission frequency is opening up new scenario. One could imagine that rather than assigning a certain frequency to a certain usage (purpose) one might negotiate the use of a frequency once it has a need for it. That would make possible to use those parts of the spectrum that at that particular time are not used. This is often calld the “WhiteSpectrum”.

If technologically feasible (and it will be) it may look like a great idea. There are some caveats though. The multiplication of spectrum is immediately decreasing its economic value and Operators have paid (and are asked to pay) a lot for being assigned a tiny slice of spectrum. Clearly some sort of compensation would be required.

Secondly, the management of the WhiteSpectrum has to be done, on an equal footing, by both the terminal and the base station. Actually, we might imagine a point where the basestation is exactly like a terminal, its only difference being the tail connecting it to the wireline network (the backhauling).

At this point it is easy to see that alternative network paradigms, based on viral networks where all terminals are making up the network, are viable. One terminal that happens to be in the vicinity of a wired line may play a base station role. This could lead to a major biz disruption.

We are still far, technologically speaking, from that point, may 10 to 20 years, butexperience shows that everytime we forecast something further in the past “because” technology hurdles of today may look the solution very difficult, we end up discovering that the future arrives much earlier than expected.

Better to start thinking about it.

Dave Reed presented today his views on communications in the next decade.

Communications as it has evolved in the last century reflected the industry behind it: telecommunications (Telcos) was about connecting relatively distant people that in a way know how to reach each other (telephone number) and radio / television (broadcasters) was about creating content in specific controlled places and then make it available to all.

In the next years we will see communications as part of the awareness of individuals in an environment, the trust associated to communities of strangers (the fabric of Society), the sharing of content generated everywhere.

In this framework Internet is a connectivity utility and this is what can be called the first cloud. The second cloud identify the space where resources are (that corresponds to the cloud computing concept). Resources become utility.

The third cloud provides mobile and social interaction as a utility. Mobility refers to people, not to terminals. Social communications centers on relationships and membership as a way to define identity.

The concept of utility is important because it inherently scales and the concept of a cloud, being unbounded, lend itself to virality (it tends to expand by its own). A mobile device will connect to a multitude of gateways in a non hierarchical environment. The connectivity is flat and every person will carry on himself a personal router that interacts with the environment and establishes all sort of local communications links. It (personally) orchestrates the environment through sensors to sense the presence and activity in the neighborhood intercepting intent/interest/disinterest. The neighborhood is both physical and social and the search happens through exploration using neighbors.

In his view there is no special relevance in communications of a public network and the terminals have the upper hand, not because they are more intelligent but because they represent the persons communicating.