Network Function Virtualization and Software-Defined Networking
Software- and virtualization technologies bring the communication network closer to the datacenter, enabling telecom applications with unseen flexibility. The research group was one of the first on the European level to research new control mechanisms improving network reliability in Software-Defined Networking.
Current research focuses on how high-performance can be achieved in telecom services using software-based components. Network service performance monitoring and prediction play a crucial role in this research. The optimization of the control process and orchestration of virtualized network services is another focus of the group. A crucial show case of this novel research focuses on 5G-driven services, backed by the virtualization of the mobile core network.
Another research topic deals with optimized management of service workflows, ensuring sufficient service quality levels. Such management functions include efficient deployment of workflows on shared hardware resources, advance reservation scheduling of service flows and constrained placement of Service Function Chains (SFC).
The research involves a mix of algorithmic design, software development and evaluation in either simulated or emulated environments working further with cutting-edge software-development and virtualization technologies.
Staff
Didier Colle, Mario Pickavet, Filip De Turck, Tim Wauters, Wouter Tavernier
Researchers
Askhat Nuriddinov, Gourav Sharma, Thomas Soenen, Dimitri Staessens, Steven Van Rossem, Chong Wang
Projects
- EU project SONATA
- EU project UNIFY
- EU project Flamingo
Key publications
- Sahhaf, S., Tavernier, W., Rost, M., Schmid, S., Colle, D., Pickavet, M., & Demeester, P. (2015). Network service chaining with optimized network function embedding supporting service decompositions. Computer Networks,93, 492-505.
- Sharma, S., Staessens, D., Colle, D., Pickavet, M., & Demeester, P. (2013). OpenFlow: Meeting carrier-grade recovery requirements. Computer Communications, 36(6), 656-665.
- Naudts, B., Tavernier, W., Verbrugge, S., Colle, D., & Pickavet, M. (2016). Deploying SDN and NFV at the speed of innovation: Toward a new bond between standards development organizations, industry fora, and open-source software projects. IEEE Communications Magazine, 54(3), 46-53.
- Sharma, S., Tavernier, W., Sahhaf, S., Colle, D., Pickavet, M., & Demeester, P. (2015). Verification of Flow Matching Functionality in the Forwarding Plane of OpenFlow Networks. IEICE Transactions on Communications, 98(11), 2190-2201.
- Rashid Mijumbi, Joan Serrat, Juan-Luis Gorricho, Niels Bouten, Filip De Turck, Raouf Boutaba. Network Function Virtualization: State-of-the-art and Research Challenges. IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials, Published, 2016.
- Hendrik Moens Filip De Turck, Shared resource network-aware impact determination algorithms for service workflow deployment with partial cloud offloading (2015) Journal of Network and Computer Applications. 49. p.99-111.
- Maryam Barshan, Hendrik Moens, Jeroen Famaey and Filip De Turck, Deadline-aware advance reservation scheduling algorithms for media production networks, (2016) Computer Communications. 77. p.26-40.
