Optimization of communication networks has witnessed an impressive growth of research activities over the last ten years. In addition to viewing networks as objects to be optimized, some of these works also view networks as optimizers themselves. In addition to "Design by Optimization", some recent results also demonstrate the principle of "Design for Optimizability". More than a tool to solve for optimality, optimization theory has also provided to networking applications the following: a modeling language for design, a reverse-engineering methodology for analysis, a theoretical foundation for architectural decisions, a quantitative basis for fairness and robustness, and even an indicator of flaws in engineering assumptions. Many of these new uses of optimization actually do not involve solving any problem for optimality. Drawing specific results on open problems in stochastic utility maximization and Internet routing, this talk surveys these emerging trends that give rise to many new meanings of the phrase "Optimization of Networks".
BiographyMung Chiang is an Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering and an affiliated faculty of Applied and Computational Mathematics and of Computer Science at Princeton University. He received the B.S. (Honors) in Electrical Engineering and Mathematics, M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University in 1999, 2000, and 2003, respectively. He conducts research in the areas of nonlinear optimization of communication systems, theoretical foundation of network architectures, algorithms in broadband access networks, and stochastic models of communications. He has been awarded as a Hertz Foundation Fellow and Stanford Graduate Fellow, and received Stanford University School of Engineering Terman Award, SBC Communications New Technology Introduction Contribution Award, NSF CAREER Award, and Princeton University Howard B. Wentz Junior Faculty Award. One of his papers becomes the Fast Breaking Paper in Computer Science in 2006 according to ISI's citation frequency. He also co-authored papers that received best student paper award at IEEE GLOBECOM and best paper award finalists at IEEE VTC and INFOCOM.
Mung Chiang is the Lead Guest Editor of the Special Issue of IEEE Journal of Selected Areas in Communications on "Nonlinear Optimization of Communication Systems", a Guest Editor of the Joint Special Issue of IEEE Transactions on Information Theory and IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking on "Networking and Information Theory", an Editor of IEEE Transactions on Wireless Communications, Program Co-Chair of the 38th Conference on Information Sciences and Systems, and co-editor of the new Springer book series on "Optimization and Control of Communication Systems".