Multi-Element Multihop Backhaul Reconfigurable Antenna NEtwork.

The ongoing proliferation of wireless broadband data services is expected to increase the traffic on the backhaul network, which transports data between the access network and the wired Internet. The typical upgrade of wired lines to high-speed fiber networks is not always an available or economically attractive solution. In such cases, wireless alternatives could offer an appealing alternative. We propose the design of efficient wireless backhaul networks that meet the Quality of Service (QoS) demands of high speed access wireless networks, thus providing a technology shortcut that will help to satisfy the social need for broadband data anytime, anywhere and in a faster way.

 Project Highlights

• FP6 WorkProgram Objective: Broadband for All
• EU funding: € 2.8 Million
• Estimated costs: €4.3 Million
• Project web site: http://www.ist-membrane.org

Project Goals

• Bring an efficient wireless backhaul design as an alternative technology to serve wireless broadband networks when a wired backhaul would be more costly to access and/or would take longer to deploy.
• Guarantee quality of service, reconfigurability, heterogeneity, ubiquity and openness requirements
• Enabling technologies: Multi-hopping, Intelligent Antennas (IA), Opportunistic routing & scheduling

CEFRIEL Contribution

• Multi-hop backhaul IP network design
• TCP optimization (the classic TCP, designed for wired networks, has some performance problems when used in wireless networks)

Project Consortium

• Imperial College (UK)
• Lucent (UK)
• ETH Zurich (CH)
• Intel (RU)
• CEFRIEL (IT)
• Intracom (GR)
• Telefonica (ES)