Digital Communications and Networking Commons^™

Increasing Efficiency In Boundary Security With Wireless Sensor Networks And Geospatial Information Systems Using Homology Theory, Luis Berumen^, Eric Chaidez^, Hamide Dogan*, Jose Gerardo Rosiles**

COURI Symposium Abstracts, Spring 2011

As part of an institutional investigation, we attempt to address the challenges the US customs and Border protection agency faces in the El Paso region. Our research focuses on defining a system for the surveillance application, and the use of mathematical models employed to achieve a greater efficiency of such architecture. With the use of the defined system, we apply homology theory through the algebraic process of topology, to accomplish an independent coordinate-free based system, which covers the surveillance area, with lesser quantity of sensor nodes. Our architecture makes the use of an operating system for wireless sensor networks; TinyOS, …

Malicious And Malfunctioning Node Detection Via Observed Physical Layer Data, Tyler J. Hardy

Theses and Dissertations

There are many mechanisms that can cause inadequate or unreliable information in sensor networks. A user of the network might be interested in detecting and classifying specific sensors nodes causing these problems. Several network layer based trust methods have been developed in previous research to assess these issues; in contrast this work develops a trust protocol based on observations of physical layer data collected by the sensors. Observations of physical layer data are used for decisions and calculations, and are based on just the measurements collected by the sensors. Although this information is packaged and distributed on the network layer, …

Routing Uavs To Co-Optimize Mission Effectiveness And Network Performance With Dynamic Programming, Spenser D. Lee

Theses and Dissertations

In support of the Air Force Research Laboratory's (AFRL) vision of the layered sensing operations center, command and control intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance (C2ISR) more focus must be placed on architectures that support information systems, rather than just the information systems themselves. By extending the role of UAVs beyond simply intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) operations and into a dual-role with networking operations we can better utilize our information assets. To achieve the goal of dual-role UAVs, a concrete approach to planning must be taken. This research defines a mathematical model and a non-trivial deterministic algorithmic approach to determining UAV …

Evaluating Information Assurance Control Effectiveness On An Air Force Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition (Scada) System, Jason R. Nielsen

Theses and Dissertations

Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems are increasingly being connected to corporate networks which has dramatically expanded their attack surface to remote cyber attack. Adversaries are targeting these systems with increasing frequency and sophistication. This thesis seeks to answer the research question addressing which Information Assurance (IA) controls are most significant for network defenders and SCADA system managers/operators to focus on in order to increase the security of critical infrastructure systems against a Stuxnet-like cyber attack. This research applies the National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST) IA controls to an attack tree modeled on a remote Stuxnet-like cyber …

Creating A Network Model For The Integration Of Dynamic And Static Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition (Scada) Test Environment, Marlon Coerbell

Theses and Dissertations

Since 9/11 protecting our critical infrastructure has become a national priority. Presidential Decision Directive 63 mandates and lays a foundation for ensuring all aspects of our nation's critical infrastructure remain secure. Key in this debate is the fact that much of our electrical power grid fails to meet the spirit of this requirement. My research leverages the power afforded by Electric Power and Communication Synchronizing Simulator (EPOCHS) developed with the assistance of Dr. Hopkinson, et al. The power environment is modeled in an electrical simulation environment called PowerWorld©. The network is modeled in OPNET® and populated with self-similar network and …

A Cooperative Diversity-Based Robust Mac Protocol In Wireless Ad Hoc Networks, Sangman Moh, Chansu Yu

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

In interference-rich and noisy environment, wireless communication is often hampered by unreliable communication links. Recently, there has been active research on cooperative communication that improves the communication reliability by having a collection of radio terminals transmit signals in a cooperative way. This paper proposes a medium access control (MAC) algorithm, called Cooperative Diversity MAC (CD-MAC), which exploits the cooperative communication capability of the physical (PHY) layer to improve robustness in wireless ad hoc networks. In CD-MAC, each terminal proactively selects a partner for cooperation and lets it transmit simultaneously so that this mitigates interference from nearby terminals, and thus, improves …

On Reducing Communication Energy Using Cross-Sensor Coding Technique, Kien Nguyen, Thinh Nguyen, Sen-Ching Cheung

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

This paper addresses the uneven communication energy problem in data gathering sensor networks where the nodes closer to the sink tend to consume more energy than those of the farther nodes. Consequently, the lifetime of a network is significantly shortened. We propose a cross-sensor coding technique using On-Off keying which exploits (a) the tradeoff between delay and energy consumption and (b) the network topology in order to alleviate the problem of unequal energy consumption. We formulate our coding problem as an integer linear programming problem and show how to construct a number of codes based on different criteria. We show …

Special Issue On Information Dissemination And New Services In P2p Systems, Min Song, Sachin Shetty, Wenbin Jiang, E. K. Park

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Information dissemination is an important P2P application that has received considerable research attention in recent years. P2P information dissemination systems range from simple file sharing applications to more complex systems that allows users to securely and efficiently publish, organize, index, search, update and retrieve data in a distributed storage medium. For complex P2P information dissemination systems, there is a need for features which include security, anonymity, fairness, scalability, resource management, and organization capabilities. For effective information dissemination, following features of P2P systems and infrastructure need to be updated: distributed object location and routing mechanisms, novel approaches to content replication, caching …

Application Of Stochastic Diffusion For Hiding High Fidelity Encrypted Images, Jonathan Blackledge, Abdulrahman Al-Rawi

Articles

Cryptography coupled with information hiding has received increased attention in recent years and has become a major research theme because of the importance of protecting encrypted information in any Electronic Data Interchange system in a way that is both discrete and covert. One of the essential limitations in any cryptography system is that the encrypted data provides an indication on its importance which arouses suspicion and makes it vulnerable to attack. Information hiding of Steganography provides a potential solution to this issue by making the data imperceptible, the security of the hidden information being a threat only if its existence …

Spectrum Adaptation In Cognitive Radio Systems With Operating Constraints, Deepak R. Joshi

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

The explosion of high-data-rate-demanding wireless applications such as smart-phones and wireless Internet access devices, together with growth of existing wireless services, are creating a shortage of the scarce Radio Frequency (RF) spectrum. However, several spectrum measurement campaigns revealed that current spectrum usage across time and frequency is inefficient, creating the artificial shortage of the spectrum because of the traditional exclusive "command-and-control" model of using the spectrum. Therefore, a new concept of Cognitive Radio (CR) has been emerging recently in which unlicensed users temporarily borrow spectrum from the licensed Primary Users (PU) based on the Dynamic Spectrum Access (DSA) technique that …

Self-Stabilizing Group Membership Protocol, Mahesh Subedi

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

In this thesis, we consider the problem of partitioning a network into groups of bounded diameter.

Given a network of processes X and a constant D, the group partition problem is the problem of finding a D-partition of X, that is, a partition of X into disjoint connected subgraphs, which we call groups, each of diameter no greater than D. The minimal group partition problem is to find a D-partition {G1, ... Gm} of X such that no two groups can be combined; that is, for any Gi and Gj, where i ≠ j, either Gi U Gj is disconnected …

Applying Image Matching To Video Analysis, Adam J. Behring

Theses and Dissertations

Dealing with the volume of multimedia collected on a daily basis for intelligence gathering and digital forensics investigations requires significant manual analysis. A component of this problem is that a video may be reanalyzed that has already been analyzed. Identifying duplicate video sequences is difficult due to differences in videos of varying quality and size. This research uses a kd-tree structure to increase image matching speed. Keypoints are generated and added to a kd-tree of a large dimensionality (128 dimensions). All of the keypoints for the set of images are used to construct a global kd-tree, which allows nearest neighbor …

Scan Loss Pattern Synthesis For Adaptive Array Ground Stations, William C. Barott, Mary Ann Ingram, Paul G. Steffes

Publications

We present several techniques for maximizing the contact time between low Earth orbiting satellites (LEOs) and a ground station (GS). The GS comprises an adaptive array of electronically steered space-fed lenses (SFLs). Each SFL is manufactured as a low-cost printed circuit with the result that it exhibits scanning loss. By differently orienting the boresights of the SFLs in the adaptive array, the SFL's scanning losses can be made to optimally complement the path loss of the LEO, thereby reducing the cost of the GS while maximizing the download capacity of the satellite link. The optimization, implemented with a genetic algorithm …

Attaining Realistic Simulations Of Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks, Derek J. Huber

Theses and Dissertations

Mobile Ad-hoc Networks (MANET) are comprised of wireless systems that communicate without the assistance of centrally managed routers or base stations. MANET research and development has increased due to computing technologies offering smaller, faster, smarter, and more power efficient platforms to operate on. Largely the testing and evaluation of new and existing MANET protocols has resided in simulation environments. This is due in part to the complexities and expenses incurred when conducting real world tests. Many researchers have come to recognize that these current simulations tend to assume away critical components of the MANET domain. These assumptions are made either …

Characterization Of The Rfx400 For Use In Software Defined Radio, Edward Adams

Computer Engineering

While software defined radio is an extremely flexible technology that is fairly rarely used, as a single purpose radio is much cheaper, it provides an excellent means of learning RF and communications skills through the lens of digital electronics, and it would behoove a Cal Poly student interested in these areas to take on a project in software defined radio. This project aims to lower the barrier to entry for future students to undertake such a project. The use of an up-converter/down-converter is documented for future students to interface with.

Ofdm Simulation In Matlab, Paul Guanming Lin

Electrical Engineering

The objective of this project is to demonstrate the concept and feasibility of an OFDM system, and investigate how its performance is changed by varying some of its major parameters. This objective is met by developing a MATLAB program to simulate a basic OFDM system. From the process of this development, the mechanism of an OFDM system can be studied; and with a completed MATLAB program, the characteristics of an OFDM system can be explored.

5 Ghz Band Vehicle-To-Vehicle Channels: Models For Multiple Values Of Channel Bandwidth, Qiong Wu, David W. Matolak, Indranil Sen

Faculty Publications

In Sen and Matolak's earlier paper, 5-GHz-band vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) channel models were presented for channel bandwidths of 5 and 10 MHz. In this paper, we provide additional tapped delay line models for bandwidths of 1, 20, 33.33, and 50 MHz based upon the data used in Sen and Matolak's paper. We provide tables of channel parameters for five types of V2V channel classes and also include example tap correlation coefficients. Root-mean-square delay spread values are summarized, as are values of bandwidth for which the channel frequency correlation takes values of 0.7 and 0.5. As with the results from Sen and …

Touch Screen Sound Controller, James Fenley, Jonathan Law

Electrical Engineering

The Touch Screen Sound Controller sets out to explore the use of a touch screen as a sound control interface for the disk jockey profession. In addition, the project aims to provide an alternate means of transferring audio data by way of TCP/IP communications as opposed to MIDI. By applying our method, a user may stream pulse-code modulated data from a server onto a client’s RAM via an Ethernet connection. A 32bit, 200MHz ARM9 microprocessor addresses data from the RAM and proceeds with executing DSP instructions from the user. The connection between the touch screen and the central microprocessor is …

Embedding Gps Data Into Speech Signal, Kagan Can

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Communication between deployed troops is very important on a battlefield. The real time knowledge of the location of the communicating patter is also very important in many situations because if you do not know the exact position of your units you cannot give correct orders. A minor error in an order can cause fatal results or lead to defeat. In many cases the position of the units is given through the speech channel by simply speaking the coordinates of the location. This can cause misunderstandings due to misinterpretation of the speech and makes it unsafe to rely on such communications. …

Reputation-Based Trust For A Cooperative, Agent-Based Backup Protection Scheme For Power Networks, John F. Borowski

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis research explores integrating a reputation-based trust mechanism with an agent-based backup protection system to improve the performance of traditional backup relay methods that are currently in use in power transmission systems. Integrating agent technology into relay protection schemes has been previously proposed to clear faults more rapidly and to add precision by enabling the use of adaptive protection methods. A distributed, cooperative trust system such as that used in peer-to-peer file sharing networks has the potential to add an additional layer of defense in a protection system designed to operate with greater autonomy. This trust component enables agents …

Static And Dynamic Component Obfuscation On Reconfigurable Devices, Camdon R. Cady

Theses and Dissertations

Computing systems are used in virtually every aspect of our lives. Technology such as smart phones and electronically controlled subsystems in cars is becoming so commonly used that it is virtually ubiquitous. Sometimes, this technology can be exploited to perform functions that it was never intended to perform, or fail to provide information that it is supposed to protect. X-HIA was shown to be effective at identifying several circuit components in a significantly shorter time than previous identification methods. Instead of requiring a number of input/output pairings that grows factorially or exponentially as the circuit size grows, it requires only …

Modeling Computer Communication Networks In A Realistic 3d Environment, Charles R. Rowell Jr.

Theses and Dissertations

Communication network simulations have typically been visualized in the past through 2D representations, but this is insufficient for battlefield network scenarios. Visual representations of battlefield networks greatly benefit from 3D visualization due to its ability to retain asset location. This research investigates the feasibility of modeling a typical battlefield communication network in a realistic 3D manner and discusses the effects of doing so. The result is an open source, 3D network visualization tool that can create highly intuitive connected battlefield scenes, enabling the user to quickly comprehend network state. It highlights mobile assets, packet movement, and node connectivity while allowing …

Global Positioning Logger, Matthew Hall

Computer Engineering

The Global Positioning Logger (GPL) is a mobile embedded device that utilizes GPS technology. The GPS data is used to display current speed and past global locations.

Reverberation-Chamber Test Environment For Outdoor Urban Wireless Propagation Studies, Helge Fielitz, Kate A. Remley, Christopher L. Holloway, Qian Zhang, Qiong Wu, David W. Matolak

Faculty Publications

We introduce a test environment to replicate the well-known clustering of reflections in power delay profiles arising from late-time delays and reflections. Urban wireless propagation environments are known to exhibit such clustering. The test setup combines discrete reflections generated by a fading simulator with the continuous distribution of reflections created in a reverberation chamber. We describe measurements made in an urban environment in Denver, CO, that illustrate these multiple distributions of reflections. Our comparison of measurements made in the urban environment to those made in the new test environment shows good agreement.

E-Fraud Prevention Based On The Self-Authentication Of E-Documents, Jonathan Blackledge, Eugene Coyle

Conference papers

We consider a method for preventing e-Fraud in which a binary image is encrypted with a floating point cipher using a convolution operation and the output quantized into a 1-bit array generating a binary image ciphertext. The output is then ‘embedded’ in a host image to hide the encrypted information. Embedding is undertaken either in the lowest 1-bit layer or multiple 1-bit layers. Decryption is accomplished by: (i) extracting the binary image from the host image; (ii) correlating the result with the original cipher. In principle, any cipher generator can be used for this purpose and the method has been …

Quality-Driven Cross Layer Design For Multimedia Security Over Resource Constrained Wireless Sensor Networks, Wei Wang

Department of Computer Electronics and Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The strong need for security guarantee, e.g., integrity and authenticity, as well as privacy and confidentiality in wireless multimedia services has driven the development of an emerging research area in low cost Wireless Multimedia Sensor Networks (WMSNs). Unfortunately, those conventional encryption and authentication techniques cannot be applied directly to WMSNs due to inborn challenges such as extremely limited energy, computing and bandwidth resources. This dissertation provides a quality-driven security design and resource allocation framework for WMSNs. The contribution of this dissertation bridges the inter-disciplinary research gap between high layer multimedia signal processing and low layer computer networking. It formulates the …

Adaptive Multicast On Mobile Ad Hoc Networks Using Tree-Based Meshes With Variable Density Of Redundant Paths, Sangman Moh, Sang Jun Lee, Chansu Yu

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Multicasting has been extensively studied for mobile ad hoc networks (MANETs) because it is fundamental to many ad hoc network applications requiring close collaboration of multiple nodes in a group. A general approach is to construct an overlay structure such as multicast tree or mesh and to deliver a multicast packet to multiple receivers over the overlay structure. However, it either incurs a lot of overhead (multicast mesh) or performs poorly in terms of delivery ratio (multicast tree). This paper proposes an adaptive multicast scheme, called tree-based mesh with k-hop redundant paths (TBM _k ), …

Networks - I: An Instantiation Of Way Point Routing For Mobile Ad Hoc Networks, Waseem M. Arain, Sayeed Ghani

International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies

Mobile ad hoc networks are increasingly finding their existence in the marketplace heading to a new paradigm of pervasive computing. However there are many areas open to research in the field. Due to node mobility resulting in an ever-changing network topology, conventional routing methods cannot be applied in MANETS. Therefore, this is one of the core areas of research. Researchers are challenged to design protocols that can potentially scale to anything from thousand to tens of thousands of nodes and to reduce the route discovery latency. In this paper a different instantiation of way point routing (WPR) model is proposed, …

A Simulation Study Of Convergence Speed For Distributed Codeword Adaptation Algorithms In Cdma Wireless Systems, Sahana Maharjan

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

In this thesis we present a side-by-side comparison of interference avoidance (IA) algorithms for distributed codeword adaptation in Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) systems. In CDMA systems, the interference is determined by the values of the cross-correlation of codewords assigned to users, and various algorithms can be used for codeword optimization. The IA algorithms for codeword adaptation considered are the eigen-algorithm, the Minimum Mean Square Error (MMSE) update, and the adaptive IA algorithm, for which we investigate convergence speed using the extensive simulations of several uplink CDMA system scenarios. The results of this thesis were presented at the Fourth IEEE …

Proactive Service Migration For Long-Running Byzantine Fault-Tolerant Systems, Wenbing Zhao, H. Zhang

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

A proactive recovery scheme based on service migration for long-running Byzantine fault-tolerant systems is described. Proactive recovery is an essential method for ensuring the long-term reliability of fault-tolerant systems that are under continuous threats from malicious adversaries. The primary benefit of our proactive recovery scheme is a reduced vulnerability window under normal operation. This is achieved in two ways. First, the time-consuming reboot step is removed from the critical path of proactive recovery. Second, the response time and the service migration latency are continuously profiled and an optimal service migration interval is dynamically determined during runtime based on the observed …