Distributed Systems

Mission

This research laboratory is concerned with the design and implementation of modern distributed systems, increasingly characterized by stringent requirements in terms of large scale, dynamicity, and security.
  The research laboratory tackles the challenges of distributed systems at all levels, spanning from the definition of middleware and language constructs, down to the implementation of the supporting application-level communication protocols and operating system mechanisms.
  A strong emphasis is placed on validating the research outcomes through simulation and implementation of real systems.

Research Areas

Middleware

We design programming models meeting the needs of modern distributed systems and the corresponding distributed runtime, focusing on an efficient implementation in the face of dynamicity and large scale.

Application-level protocols

Modern distributed systems rely more and more on an application-level substrate ensuring efficient communication. Examples are protocols for content-based routing in publish-subscribe, and for building and maintaining overlay networks. Along with traditional deterministic protocols, we also study the applicability of probabilistic, gossip-based algorithms to a large number of functionalities in overlay networks, ranking from aggregation, load balancing, resource assignments, topology construction and maintenance, etc.

Distributed algorithms

We develop novel techniques for transparent object replication: objects are autonomically replicated and managed to provide a given quality of service (with respect to fault-tolerance, reliability, and dependability) and are transparently accessed through remote method invocation techniques.

Security & privacy

We design and develop security architectures and protocols to support and provide security, trust and privacy properties in very large distributed systems. One recurrent challenge is to meet security requirements within the stringent constraints (i.e. performance, usability, scalability) of the target system.  We are also interested in the study of new access control models for emerging distributed applications as social networks.

Service oriented-architectures

We study service-oriented integration technologies at the user interface, application, and data layers. We research integration models and languages that are universal (go across layers) and are simple, that is, enable composition by non programmers. We develop tools that provide integration as a service. We extend the above research to mashups and cloud computing, and study the challenges posed by the mass programming paradigm enabled by simplicity and by cloud computing. We also aim at analyzing process and service execution data to discover processes and assess compliance.

Applications Areas

Large-scale distributed computing and peer-to-peer networks

Several of our application-level protocols are applied in the implementation of systems and tools for very large-scale distributed systems, on both wired and wireless settings.

Wireless sensor networks

We have expertise in designing and implement various elements of the software layer of wireless sensor networks, including system-level mechanisms, routing protocols, as well as middleware platforms for simplifying the programming chore. Moreover, we have extensive expertise in deploying the hw/sw system for the needs of real-world applications.

Mobile, context-aware computing

We research the application of SOA in mobile environment, with particular focus on traffic applications and local/contextual human-participated service provisioning, where humans can provide local, real-time services to people in the same area (or in the same context).

Enterprise integration in health and government sectors

We apply SOA and data warehousing-based techniques to integrate patient records and health/welfare data. We work with local and global companies and institutions to provide health professionals and control authorities with the information they need to take healthcare management decisions, including funding decisions. We also work on improving patient care by researching the monitoring and management of lifestyle events and the discovery of lifestyle patterns that lead to the aggravation of ilnesses.

Members

Further Information

Research Program's Technical reports
Research Program's Published papers

The Resaerch Program is member of

• Muovi! (Application Lab)

Projects