Towards Adaptive Network Nodes via Service Chain Construction

Abstract

Network functional combination is a promising direction in enhancing Internet adaptability. It decomposes the current layered network into fine-grained building blocks and combines them on demand. However, what legacy functions should be decomposed and how to combine them in an optimal way are unclear. We propose a novel adaptive architecture called reconstructive network architecture (RECON) based on the principles of the Complex Adaptive System. This study has three main contributions. First , RECON decomposes functions of the protocol stack at layers 3 and 4 into fine-grained building blocks, called atomic capabilities to open the network core functions unlike existing solutions. Second , RECON can customize different service chains on demand by combining atomic capabilities in an optimal way. We formulate the atomic capability combination into a nonlinear integer optimization problem with the proposed algorithm to reach an appropriate tradeoff between the optimal solution and computation cost. Finally , we implement a proof-of-concept for RECON in the network node. Results are corroborated by several numerical simulations.