QoS Frameworks

As new applications start using the Internet, the requirements that they impose to the IP network are not always fulfilled. In particular time-sensitive applications such as videoconferencing, video distribution and voice have strict requirements in terms of packet loss, latency, jitter and bandwidth. This new scenario forces the network to evolve towards a model that

More >>

Multicore Architectures

Hardware designs increasingly favor multiple cores per CPU die over increased speed, resulting in number fabrication constraints. This creates a new Moore's Law in which doubling core counts every 10 months.

Modern software designs use virtualization to maximize utilization and flexibility across specific hardware implementations with efficient isolation amongst processes. These two new technology trends can be combined to enable dense efficient processing of network applications. To leverage the combination of these architectural shifts it will be necessary to use appropriate forms of loose and tightly coupled parallel algorithms and implementations.

More >>

Protocol Classification

High-speed packet classification research encompasses the investigation of novel techniques for flexible packet classification at very high speed, focusing on the protocol description and recognition components.

Flexibility is traditionally a software-based solution. Speed is most often obtained through dedicated hardware such as ASICs. Cost is commonly reduced by incorporating such capabilities into the data path of a network device.

More >>

Power

The world is shifting towards sustainability and energy efficiency. With the rise of green initiatives and carbon emission credits, markets and regulations are the first steps in a potentially massive shift in the world economy.

In recognition of these new requirements on and by governments, companies, and individual consumers, research is needed to enhance the efficiency of hardware components as well as their device-level integration, from systems power management to high-level power savings integration, and future paradigms for power efficiency in networking. We seek to catalyze creative power efficiency designs that can be enabled by the networks.

More >>

Service Infrastructure

As the Network evolves, applications we never imagined become ubiquitous and even household names. Cisco is constantly searching for these new applications so that we can add new functionality to the network. Taking this one step further , Cisco would like to sponsor research in the areas of future network based applications and services as well as the infrastructure and mechanisms needed to support them.

The goal of this initiative is to understand how the network can provide a better framework in terms of functionality and integration in today's distributed applications environment as well as to direct new research and discussions into this new model.

More >>

Optical Networking

Optical networking – specifically technology based on DWDM – has finally developed into a full networking technology with its ability to set up connections in an automated fashion. In parallel, the industry has started to integrate optical technology more closely into routers to achieve more economical core and aggregation architectures. At the same time, the ever increasing bandwidth of the Internet and new applications such as video mandate higher bit-rates per wavelength and higher spectral efficiency over the fiber, resulting in optical networks that may be harder to automate due to higher sensitivity to optical impairments.

We are seeking original applied research in the area of DWDM networking at the physical transmission layer; the control plane inside the optical layer and between it and the packet layer; and management of the optical layer and its interaction with the router.

More >>

Web X.0

With the introduction of Web 2.0 technologies, the Internet has evolved from a set of information silos into a platform for collaboration, content exchange, and application development.

Another direction is the Semantic Web, Web 3.0, whereby data will not only be represented in a human accessible format, but also in a machine accessible one. This allows for automated information search, integration, and publishing.

More >>

Routing and Addressing

The rapid growth of the Internet and the imminent depletion of IPv4 addresses are posing increasing challenges on network routing and addressing. To enhance the scalability and performance of the network, continuing studies are needed to provide efficient routing schemes and addressing methodologies. While various schemes have been proposed to address some of the issues, a satisfying and deployable solution has yet to be identified. As such, research on the problems posed by the need for a scalable routing and addressing system for the Internet is needed. Issues include (but are not limited to) the scalability of the routing system, both in terms of state (the routing table) and rate (the dynamic nature of the network), securing the routing system, and "routing system economics". Note that these issues apply to both the IPv4 and IPv6 environments.

More >>

Software Engineering

The goal of this research area is to further the understanding and management of large evolving software systems. Areas of interest include aspects of the product lifecycle, including requirements, design, implementation, validation, verification, maintenance, and evolution. The objective is to improve system quality (robustness, reliability, performance, etc.) and enhance the customer experience.

More >>

Wireless and Mobile

Given the explosion of mobile users and the proliferation of heterogeneous wireless networks, Cisco Research is actively looking to securely and seamlessly integrate applications and services with mobile clients. This requires innovations in mobile clients, mobile user experience, service delivery network, platforms, enterprise applications, wireless communications, and unified management.

We are also actively seeking research proposals in wireless and mobile technology areas such as:

More >>

Video

Enterprise applications include two way live video such as Cisco Telepresence. These video services reach consumers both through present service providers as well as enterprise corporate IT.

We invite your research thoughts on many areas related to video, including video transport over both wired and wireless packet networks, video and content distribution approaches, end user Quality of Experience, and error management.

More >>

Congestion Control and QoS

Congestion Control and Quality of Service (QoS) are key feature elements in any network system. The aspects of research in this area include designing novel algorithms for managing network bandwidth, controlling jitter and latency (required by some real-time and interactive traffic), and improving loss characteristics. Innovations in this area have a crucial impact on the next generation of network systems, especially Cisco service-enabled network infrastructure and wireless/mobile communications.

Scalability

The size of the Internet makes scalability a key issue in every aspect of a network infrastructure. For a network system, scalability depends on hardware architecture, application software architecture, underlying operating system, communication protocols and the sheer volume of data. Innovations that solve the network scalability issues can significantly increase network capacity, enable service/application level provision. Cisco is interested in researches which address the scalability issues on, but not limited to, the following set of topics: scalability issues in routing, scalability in wireless networks and scalability of network and service provisioning.

Security

The network plays one of the most important roles in the portfolio of security solutions deployed by our customers. Cisco wants to foster research in the network security area that leads to finer grain access control to network resources, to stronger authentication of users, applications and devices, and to better protection of network traffic and data at rest. This shall be accomplished without compromising the capability of the network to provide the traditional high value services in-the-network such as load balancing, intrusion prevention, or protocol acceleration just to name a few.

We are also interested into encryption for very high speed communication (100+ Gbps), protection of broadcast and multicast streaming, and efficient group key management.

Packets and Multiplexing

A fundamental assumption of the Internet is that it is a packet-switched network. Data is broken down into packets which are independently routed on communication paths based on information in the IP header. In general, the idea of packet is a good one. However, IP packet multiplexing is too fine-grained in the core of the network. While MPLS aggregation mechanisms solve the problem today, some interesting questions to ask would be: What would the network architecture look like if aggregates in the core form an integral part of the architecture? What novel network architectures would allow applications to benefit in terms of security, performance, reliability, and scalability?

Network Management

Network Management includes the spectrum of functions ranging from managing and configuring low-level devices to setting high-level network-wide policies. This encompasses network provisioning, planning, configuration, testing, failure detection and correction, and troubleshooting and repair. Managing large scale networks is challenging because the existing architecture has not been designed with management in mind. Today's networks are retrofitted with a plethora of management tools, scripts, and mechanisms that add further complexity while not making management any easier.

What would a management-oriented architecture that would ease network management look like? Centralized versus distributed management? What would the key abstractions be for a network management plane?