Emerging Technologies for Wireless Networks

Wireless network survivability is an issue of great concern to current telecommunication industry. Since loss of service in wireless network, for example cellular system, due to disaster and catastrophic failures could be devastating and result in significant revenue or even lives loss. This becomes apparent during the terrorist attacks against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. Those disasters have shown the applicability and usefulness of cellular system in providing emergency telecommunication for people having operational responsibilities at disaster sites. However, providing such service could be very expensive or impossible due to heavy traffic placed upon surviving cellular communication systems in the after effects of disaster. Thus, reducing wireless network protection and recover costs while maintaining an acceptable level of survivability has become an important challenge for network planners and engineers. This article will review technology and architectures that may be used to implement cost-effective survivable wireless network for emergency and public communication, and discuss the interworking system between survivability mechanisms and associated open issues. Standards development and the current status of deployment will also be reviewed.