NETCOM Research Group

The network infrastructure of Internet Service Providers (ISPs) undergoes constant evolution. Whenever new requirements arise (e.g., the deployment of a new Point of Presence, or a change in the business relationships with a neighboring ISP), operators need to change the configuration of the network. Maintaining service availability during reconfigurations that involve the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) is a challenge for network operators. This is due both to the complexity of BGP, which is the protocol most commonly used by ISPs to make core routing decisions on the Internet, and to the lack of methodologies and tools adequate to the task. 

The research publication «Improving Network Agility with Seamless BGP Reconfigurations» is the winner of the IETF/IRTF Applied Networking Research Prize (ANRP) “for proposing a framework to allow seamless BGP reconfigurations” that guarantees no traffic disruptions on the net.

The paper was researched by an international team of scientists from various organizations: Stefano Vissicchio, Laurent Vanbever and Olivier Bonaventure from Université Catholique de Louvain, in Belgium, Cristel Pelsser from Internet Initiative Japan (IIJ), Luca Cittadini of the Italian Roma Tre University, and Pierre Francois, who is a Staff Researcher at Institute IMDEA Networks, in Spain. This award is granted yearly for recent results in applied networking research that are relevant for transitioning into shipping internet products and related standardization efforts, by a committee of the international community IETF (The Internet Engineering Task Force) and its research arm, the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF). Together they form one of the largest communities of network designers, operators, vendors, policy makers and researchers, who agree the standard and evolution of Internet architecture and protocols. IETF is the international organization responsible for internet engineering. Made up of numerous experts from all over the world, it is divided into working groups, who jointly reach a consensus on the standardization of architectures, protocols and all issues relating to the web.

The ANRP award will be presented at the IRTF Open Meeting during IETF-87, July 28 - August 2, 2013 in Berlin, Germany. «Improving Network Agility with Seamless BGP Reconfigurations» is one out of four submissions awarded an ANRP in 2013. Laurent Vanbever, one of the authors, will present the research findings at this meeting. This publication has appeared in the IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking journal (TON).