[Colloq] Lujun Jia's Thesis Defense, Wednesday, Dec. 14 at 11:00 a.m.

[Laura Willis]

College of Computer and Information Science

PhD Dissertation Defense:
Lujun Jia

Title:
Communication Structures for Ad Hoc Networks

Wednesday, Dec 14, 2005
11:00am
166 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 dissertation, we study several techniques for building
effective communication structures for such networks, including a
near-optimal distributed dominating set algorithm for network clustering,
topology control for energy-efficient ad hoc routing, MAC layer
transmission control, and a group independent data aggregation
protocol for sensor networks based on the concept of universal Steiner
trees.

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
propose 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.

Thesis committee:

Paul Attie (American University of Beirut)
Guevara Noubir
Rajmohan Rajaraman (Advisor)
Ravi Sundaram
Roger Wattenhofer (ETH Zurich)
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