Networks & Distributed Systems
The speed with which computers and their associated networks have revolutionized life in the last quarter of the twentieth century is astounding. Today, we are laying the groundwork for the way that revolution will continue to alter our day-to-day existence in this coming millenium.
J.J. Garcia-Luna
Professor of Computer Engineering
There are a number of challenges to meet in connecting the world via large-scale networks and distributed systems. The intersection of computers, data storage, networks and users creates issues to address in:
- Wireless networks
- Web caching
- Network performance analysis
- Network security and quality-of-service guarantees
- Bandwith allocation and congestion control, and
- Multimedia.
The UC Santa Cruz School of Engineering is developing leading-edge solutions in each of these areas. In the area of wireless networks and mobile computing, for example, researchers at the UC Santa Cruz School of Engineering are working to extend the global communications infrastructure through wireless Internet gateways (dubbed "WINGs"). Work is also in progress to help lay the groundwork for the next generation of Internet protocols and architecture, including the development of new communications protocols to provide quality of service and security guarantees to a wide variety of end-users with different needs.
Other projects focus on reliable multicasting, multicast routing, scalable routing and congestion control, as well as the design and analysis of traffic scheduling algorithms for high-speed networks. The UC Santa Cruz School of Engineering is also developing leading-edge solutions in the analysis and design of methods for caching data, storage systems hierarchies, wide-area distributed systems, security and performance.
People
The talents assembled at the UC Santa Cruz School of Engineering to advance the state of the art in networks and distributed systems include:
Alexandre Brandwajn, whose research focuses on systems modeling and performance.
J.J. Garcia-Luna-Aceves, a former center director at SRI International whose projects focus on wireless networking and internetworking.
Darrell Long, whose research interests lie in distributed systems, particularly high-speed storage systems, fault tolerance, performance evaluation and mobile computing.
Patrick Mantey, whose research is motivated by computer applications and their systems components and who brings to the team extensive computer industry experience.
Katia Obraczka, whose interests include computer networks, distributed systems, Internet information systems, and operating systems.
Anujan Varma, who specializes in high-speed networks.
Research
Computer Communication Research Group, dedicated to basic and applied research in computer communication.
Computer Systems Lab, focusing on caching, storage systems hierarchies, wide-area distributed systems, security and performance.
High-Speed Networks Lab, exploring and expanding the field of high-speed computer networking and communication.
Internetwork Research Group (i-NRG), conducting research in the design, experimental evaluation, and implementation of network protocols for internetworks consisting of wired as well as wireless networks. Research activities span a number of areas in computer networks and distributed systems.