Title: Information Dynamics in Complex Networks

Abstract: Management approaches of conventional networking systems contain static assumptions about the structure of information content exchanged in a network. Examples of related scenarios include distributed routing methods and policies that do not factor in the type of information exchanged during high interference, intermittent connectivity, or network failure, compromise, and attack. These assumptions are also apparent in coding, policy, and protocol approaches that do not recognize and exploit variability and dynamics in information structure between different types of sources, users, and applications. Additionally, many network policies do not track and account for variation in traffic type, purpose, or volume, number of functioning nodes, or changing security conditions. As a result, we propose a need for network estimation, coding, and policy methods that can rapidly evaluate, track and manage dynamics both in the type of information content exchanged on networks and the resulting performance of the global network.