[Colloq] Lujun Jian - Comprehensive Exam, THURSDAY, MAY 12, 10AM

Rachel Kalweit rachelb at ccs.neu.edu
Tue May 10 11:13:55 EDT 2005




College of Computer and Information Science

PhD Comprehensive Exam:
Lujun Jia

Title:
Communication Structures for Ad Hoc Networks

Thursday, May 12, 2005
10:00am
366 West Village H

Abstract:
An ad hoc wireless network consists of a collection of geographically 
dispersed and battery-powered nodes communicating with one another over 
a shared wireless medium using paths that may traverse multiple nodes. 
The multi-hop nature, combined with severe energy restriction, poses a 
number of challenging tasks in the design of communication structures 
for ad hoc networks. In this thesis, we study several techniques for 
building effective communication structures for such networks, including 
clustering, energy-efficient topology control, MAC layer transmission 
control, multicast and data aggregation.

Our proposed techniques target communication structures in multiple 
layers of the protocol stack, including link layer, MAC layer, network 
layer, and application layer. In each of our individual studies, we look 
for local algorithms, in which the computation relies only on message 
exchanges between neighboring nodes or within a small geographical 
region. Such computationally light-weight protocols are highly desirable 
for the simple reason that global communication is expensive in 
resource-constrainted multi-hop networks. Our work also highlights a 
distinguishing characteristic in ad hoc network design -- the effect of 
application layer metrics on all other layers in the protocol stack.

In the talk, we will first introduce wireless ad hoc and sensor 
networks, and briefly discuss our previous results on clustering, 
topology control and MAC layer transmission control.  We then 
concentrate on our latest research on universal Steiner tree and its 
applications to group-oblivious multicast and data aggregation in sensor 
networks.  Finally, we outline future research for completion of the PhD 
thesis.

Thesis committee:

Paul Attie
Guevara Noubir
Rajmohan Rajaraman (Advisor)
Ravi Sundaram
Roger Wattenhofer (ETH Zurich)




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