Author
Nicola Santoro
Other affiliations: University of Waterloo, University of Bari, University of Ottawa ...read more
Bio: Nicola Santoro is an academic researcher from Carleton University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Mobile robot & Distributed algorithm. The author has an hindex of 54, co-authored 357 publications receiving 10693 citations. Previous affiliations of Nicola Santoro include University of Waterloo & University of Bari.
Papers published on a yearly basis
Papers
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TL;DR: This paper presents a hierarchical classification of TVGs; each class corresponds to a significant property examined in the distributed computing literature, and examines how TVGs can be used to study the evolution of network properties, and proposes different techniques, depending on whether the indicators for these properties are atemporal or temporal.
Abstract: The past few years have seen intensive research efforts carried out in some apparently unrelated areas of dynamic systems – delay-tolerant networks, opportunistic-mobility networks and social networks – obtaining closely related insights. Indeed, the concepts discovered in these investigations can be viewed as parts of the same conceptual universe, and the formal models proposed so far to express some specific concepts are the components of a larger formal description of this universe. The main contribution of this paper is to integrate the vast collection of concepts, formalisms and results found in the literature into a unified framework, which we call time-varying graphs TVGs. Using this framework, it is possible to express directly in the same formalism not only the concepts common to all those different areas, but also those specific to each. Based on this definitional work, employing both existing results and original observations, we present a hierarchical classification of TVGs; each class corresponds to a significant property examined in the distributed computing literature. We then examine how TVGs can be used to study the evolution of network properties, and propose different techniques, depending on whether the indicators for these properties are atemporal as in the majority of existing studies or temporal. Finally, we briefly discuss the introduction of randomness in TVGs.
466 citations
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TL;DR: This paper presents a protocol that allows anonymous oblivious robots with limited visibility to gather in the same location in finite time, provided they have orientation (i.e., agreement on a coordinate system), indicating that, with respect to gathering, orientation is at least as powerful as instantaneous movements.
423 citations
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28 Aug 2012
TL;DR: This book focuses on the recent algorithmic results in the field of distributed computing by oblivious mobile robots (unable to remember the past), and introduces the computational model with its nuances, focusing on basic coordination problems: pattern formation, gathering, scattering, leader election, as well as on dynamic tasks such as flocking.
Abstract: The study of what can be computed by a team of autonomous mobile robots, originally started in robotics and AI, has become increasingly popular in theoretical computer science (especially in distributed computing), where it is now an integral part of the investigations on computability by mobile entities. The robots are identical computational entities located and able to move in a spatial universe; they operate without explicit communication and are usually unable to remember the past; they are extremely simple, with limited resources, and individually quite weak. However, collectively the robots are capable of performing complex tasks, and form a system with desirable fault-tolerant and self-stabilizing properties. The research has been concerned with the computational aspects of such systems. In particular, the focus has been on the minimal capabilities that the robots should have in order to solve a problem. This book focuses on the recent algorithmic results in the field of distributed computing by oblivious mobile robots (unable to remember the past). After introducing the computational model with its nuances, we focus on basic coordination problems: pattern formation, gathering, scattering, leader election, as well as on dynamic tasks such as flocking. For each of these problems, we provide a snapshot of the state of the art, reviewing the existing algorithmic results. In doing so, we outline solution techniques, and we analyze the impact of the different assumptions on the robots' computability power. Table of Contents: Introduction / Computational Models / Gathering and Convergence / Pattern Formation / Scatterings and Coverings / Flocking / Other Directions
309 citations
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TL;DR: The main contribution of this paper is to review and integrate the collection of these concepts, formalisms, and related results found in the literature into a unified coherent framework, called TVG (for timevarying graphs).
Abstract: The past few years have seen intensive research efforts carried out in some apparently unrelated areas of dynamic systems -- delay-tolerant networks, opportunistic-mobility networks, social networks -- obtaining closely related insights. Indeed, the concepts discovered in these investigations can be viewed as parts of the same conceptual universe; and the formal models proposed so far to express some specific concepts are components of a larger formal description of this universe. The main contribution of this paper is to integrate the vast collection of concepts, formalisms, and results found in the literature into a unified framework, which we call TVG (for time-varying graphs). Using this framework, it is possible to express directly in the same formalism not only the concepts common to all those different areas, but also those specific to each. Based on this definitional work, employing both existing results and original observations, we present a hierarchical classification of TVGs; each class corresponds to a significant property examined in the distributed computing literature. We then examine how TVGs can be used to study the evolution of network properties, and propose different techniques, depending on whether the indicators for these properties are a-temporal (as in the majority of existing studies) or temporal. Finally, we briefly discuss the introduction of randomness in TVGs.
253 citations
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TL;DR: There is, I think, something ethereal about i —the square root of minus one, which seems an odd beast at that time—an intruder hovering on the edge of reality.
Abstract: There is, I think, something ethereal about i —the square root of minus one. I remember first hearing about it at school. It seemed an odd beast at that time—an intruder hovering on the edge of reality.
Usually familiarity dulls this sense of the bizarre, but in the case of i it was the reverse: over the years the sense of its surreal nature intensified. It seemed that it was impossible to write mathematics that described the real world in …
33,785 citations
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01 Jan 2004
TL;DR: This book offers a detailed and comprehensive presentation of the basic principles of interconnection network design, clearly illustrating them with numerous examples, chapter exercises, and case studies, allowing a designer to see all the steps of the process from abstract design to concrete implementation.
Abstract: One of the greatest challenges faced by designers of digital systems is optimizing the communication and interconnection between system components. Interconnection networks offer an attractive and economical solution to this communication crisis and are fast becoming pervasive in digital systems. Current trends suggest that this communication bottleneck will be even more problematic when designing future generations of machines. Consequently, the anatomy of an interconnection network router and science of interconnection network design will only grow in importance in the coming years.
This book offers a detailed and comprehensive presentation of the basic principles of interconnection network design, clearly illustrating them with numerous examples, chapter exercises, and case studies. It incorporates hardware-level descriptions of concepts, allowing a designer to see all the steps of the process from abstract design to concrete implementation.
·Case studies throughout the book draw on extensive author experience in designing interconnection networks over a period of more than twenty years, providing real world examples of what works, and what doesn't.
·Tightly couples concepts with implementation costs to facilitate a deeper understanding of the tradeoffs in the design of a practical network.
·A set of examples and exercises in every chapter help the reader to fully understand all the implications of every design decision.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 Introduction to Interconnection Networks
1.1 Three Questions About Interconnection Networks
1.2 Uses of Interconnection Networks
1.3 Network Basics
1.4 History
1.5 Organization of this Book
Chapter 2 A Simple Interconnection Network
2.1 Network Specifications and Constraints
2.2 Topology
2.3 Routing
2.4 Flow Control
2.5 Router Design
2.6 Performance Analysis
2.7 Exercises
Chapter 3 Topology Basics
3.1 Nomenclature
3.2 Traffic Patterns
3.3 Performance
3.4 Packaging Cost
3.5 Case Study: The SGI Origin 2000
3.6 Bibliographic Notes
3.7 Exercises
Chapter 4 Butterfly Networks
4.1 The Structure of Butterfly Networks
4.2 Isomorphic Butterflies
4.3 Performance and Packaging Cost
4.4 Path Diversity and Extra Stages
4.5 Case Study: The BBN Butterfly
4.6 Bibliographic Notes
4.7 Exercises
Chapter 5 Torus Networks
5.1 The Structure of Torus Networks
5.2 Performance
5.3 Building Mesh and Torus Networks
5.4 Express Cubes
5.5 Case Study: The MIT J-Machine
5.6 Bibliographic Notes
5.7 Exercises
Chapter 6 Non-Blocking Networks
6.1 Non-Blocking vs. Non-Interfering Networks
6.2 Crossbar Networks
6.3 Clos Networks
6.4 Benes Networks
6.5 Sorting Networks
6.6 Case Study: The Velio VC2002 (Zeus) Grooming Switch
6.7 Bibliographic Notes
6.8 Exercises
Chapter 7 Slicing and Dicing
7.1 Concentrators and Distributors
7.2 Slicing and Dicing
7.3 Slicing Multistage Networks
7.4 Case Study: Bit Slicing in the Tiny Tera
7.5 Bibliographic Notes
7.6 Exercises
Chapter 8 Routing Basics
8.1 A Routing Example
8.2 Taxonomy of Routing Algorithms
8.3 The Routing Relation
8.4 Deterministic Routing
8.5 Case Study: Dimension-Order Routing in the Cray T3D
8.6 Bibliographic Notes
8.7 Exercises
Chapter 9 Oblivious Routing
9.1 Valiant's Randomized Routing Algorithm
9.2 Minimal Oblivious Routing
9.3 Load-Balanced Oblivious Routing
9.4 Analysis of Oblivious Routing
9.5 Case Study: Oblivious Routing in the
Avici Terabit Switch Router(TSR)
9.6 Bibliographic Notes
9.7 Exercises
Chapter 10 Adaptive Routing
10.1 Adaptive Routing Basics
10.2 Minimal Adaptive Routing
10.3 Fully Adaptive Routing
10.4 Load-Balanced Adaptive Routing
10.5 Search-Based Routing
10.6 Case Study: Adaptive Routing in the
Thinking Machines CM-5
10.7 Bibliographic Notes
10.8 Exercises
Chapter 11 Routing Mechanics
11.1 Table-Based Routing
11.2 Algorithmic Routing
11.3 Case Study: Oblivious Source Routing in the
IBM Vulcan Network
11.4 Bibliographic Notes
11.5 Exercises
Chapter 12 Flow Control Basics
12.1 Resources and Allocation Units
12.2 Bufferless Flow Control
12.3 Circuit Switching
12.4 Bibliographic Notes
12.5 Exercises
Chapter 13 Buffered Flow Control
13.1 Packet-Buffer Flow Control
13.2 Flit-Buffer Flow Control
13.3 Buffer Management and Backpressure
13.4 Flit-Reservation Flow Control
13.5 Bibliographic Notes
13.6 Exercises
Chapter 14 Deadlock and Livelock
14.1 Deadlock
14.2 Deadlock Avoidance
14.3 Adaptive Routing
14.4 Deadlock Recovery
14.5 Livelock
14.6 Case Study: Deadlock Avoidance in the Cray T3E
14.7 Bibliographic Notes
14.8 Exercises
Chapter 15 Quality of Service
15.1 Service Classes and Service Contracts
15.2 Burstiness and Network Delays
15.3 Implementation of Guaranteed Services
15.4 Implementation of Best-Effort Services
15.5 Separation of Resources
15.6 Case Study: ATM Service Classes
15.7 Case Study: Virtual Networks in the Avici TSR
15.8 Bibliographic Notes
15.9 Exercises
Chapter 16 Router Architecture
16.1 Basic Router Architecture
16.2 Stalls
16.3 Closing the Loop with Credits
16.4 Reallocating a Channel
16.5 Speculation and Lookahead
16.6 Flit and Credit Encoding
16.7 Case Study: The Alpha 21364 Router
16.8 Bibliographic Notes
16.9 Exercises
Chapter 17 Router Datapath Components
17.1 Input Buffer Organization
17.2 Switches
17.3 Output Organization
17.4 Case Study: The Datapath of the IBM Colony
Router
17.5 Bibliographic Notes
17.6 Exercises
Chapter 18 Arbitration
18.1 Arbitration Timing
18.2 Fairness
18.3 Fixed Priority Arbiter
18.4 Variable Priority Iterative Arbiters
18.5 Matrix Arbiter
18.6 Queuing Arbiter
18.7 Exercises
Chapter 19 Allocation
19.1 Representations
19.2 Exact Algorithms
19.3 Separable Allocators
19.4 Wavefront Allocator
19.5 Incremental vs. Batch Allocation
19.6 Multistage Allocation
19.7 Performance of Allocators
19.8 Case Study: The Tiny Tera Allocator
19.9 Bibliographic Notes
19.10 Exercises
Chapter 20 Network Interfaces
20.1 Processor-Network Interface
20.2 Shared-Memory Interface
20.3 Line-Fabric Interface
20.4 Case Study: The MIT M-Machine Network Interface
20.5 Bibliographic Notes
20.6 Exercises
Chapter 21 Error Control 411
21.1 Know Thy Enemy: Failure Modes and Fault Models
21.2 The Error Control Process: Detection, Containment,
and Recovery
21.3 Link Level Error Control
21.4 Router Error Control
21.5 Network-Level Error Control
21.6 End-to-end Error Control
21.7 Bibliographic Notes
21.8 Exercises
Chapter 22 Buses
22.1 Bus Basics
22.2 Bus Arbitration
22.3 High Performance Bus Protocol
22.4 From Buses to Networks
22.5 Case Study: The PCI Bus
22.6 Bibliographic Notes
22.7 Exercises
Chapter 23 Performance Analysis
23.1 Measures of Interconnection Network Performance
23.2 Analysis
23.3 Validation
23.4 Case Study: Efficiency and Loss in the
BBN Monarch Network
23.5 Bibliographic Notes
23.6 Exercises
Chapter 24 Simulation
24.1 Levels of Detail
24.2 Network Workloads
24.3 Simulation Measurements
24.4 Simulator Design
24.5 Bibliographic Notes
24.6 Exercises
Chapter 25 Simulation Examples 495
25.1 Routing
25.2 Flow Control Performance
25.3 Fault Tolerance
Appendix A Nomenclature
Appendix B Glossary
Appendix C Network Simulator
3,233 citations
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TL;DR: This review presents the emergent field of temporal networks, and discusses methods for analyzing topological and temporal structure and models for elucidating their relation to the behavior of dynamical systems.
Abstract: A great variety of systems in nature, society and technology -- from the web of sexual contacts to the Internet, from the nervous system to power grids -- can be modeled as graphs of vertices coupled by edges The network structure, describing how the graph is wired, helps us understand, predict and optimize the behavior of dynamical systems In many cases, however, the edges are not continuously active As an example, in networks of communication via email, text messages, or phone calls, edges represent sequences of instantaneous or practically instantaneous contacts In some cases, edges are active for non-negligible periods of time: eg, the proximity patterns of inpatients at hospitals can be represented by a graph where an edge between two individuals is on throughout the time they are at the same ward Like network topology, the temporal structure of edge activations can affect dynamics of systems interacting through the network, from disease contagion on the network of patients to information diffusion over an e-mail network In this review, we present the emergent field of temporal networks, and discuss methods for analyzing topological and temporal structure and models for elucidating their relation to the behavior of dynamical systems In the light of traditional network theory, one can see this framework as moving the information of when things happen from the dynamical system on the network, to the network itself Since fundamental properties, such as the transitivity of edges, do not necessarily hold in temporal networks, many of these methods need to be quite different from those for static networks
2,452 citations
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TL;DR: This paper proposes gradient descent algorithms for a class of utility functions which encode optimal coverage and sensing policies which are adaptive, distributed, asynchronous, and verifiably correct.
Abstract: This paper presents control and coordination algorithms for groups of vehicles. The focus is on autonomous vehicle networks performing distributed sensing tasks where each vehicle plays the role of a mobile tunable sensor. The paper proposes gradient descent algorithms for a class of utility functions which encode optimal coverage and sensing policies. The resulting closed-loop behavior is adaptive, distributed, asynchronous, and verifiably correct.
2,198 citations
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1,991 citations