Internet of Things Virtual Networks: Bringing Network Virtualization to Resource-Constrained Devices
Date
2012-11-20
Authors
Ishaq, Isam
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Abstract
Networks of smart resource-constrained objects, such as sensors and actuators, can support a wide range of application domains. In most cases these networks were proprietary and stand-alone. More recently, many efforts have been undertaken to connect these networks to the Internet using standard protocols. Current solutions that integrate smart resource-constrained objects into the Internet are mostly gateway-based. In these solutions, security, firewalling, protocol translations and intelligence are implemented by gateways at the border of the Internet and the resource-constrained networks. In this paper, we introduce a complementary approach to facilitate the realization of what is called the Internet of Things. Our approach focuses on the objects, both resource-constrained and non-constrained, that need to cooperate by integrating them into a secured virtual network, named an Internet of Things Virtual Network or IoT-VN. Inside this IoT-VN full end-to-end communication can take place through the use of protocols that take the limitations of the most resource-constrained devices into account. We describe how this concept maps to several generic use cases and, as such, can constitute a valid alternative approach for supporting selected applications. A first implementation demonstrating the key concepts of this approach is described. It illustrates the feasibility of integrating resource-constrained devices into virtual networks, but also reveals open challenges.
Description
Keywords
Internet of Things , sensors , actuators , virtualization , virtual network , network architecture , end-to-end communication , resource-constrained devices
Citation
Ishaq, Isam, Jeroen Hoebeke, Ingrid Moerman, and Piet Demeester. "Internet of things virtual networks: Bringing network virtualization to resource-constrained devices." In Green Computing and Communications (GreenCom), 2012 IEEE International Conference On, pp. 293-300. IEEE, 2012.