Physical Layer Security: Error Control Coding for Information Theoretic Security in Wireless and Beyond

Georgia Tech Research Corporation, Atlanta GA

Investigators

Abstract

The research. The research topics in this proposal are: 1) Fundamentals for the wiretap channel: error control codes for reliability and security, 2) Opportunistic wireless physical-layer security, 3) Highly reliable and secure distributed data storage. In all areas the focus is not only on theory but on practical algorithms to achieve the very high levels of security and reliability promised by information theory. The PI and collaborations: About half of the work in this proposal will be done with collaborators in Europe connected to the Georgia Tech Lorraine (GTL) campus in Metz, France where the PI was formerly Director of Research and currently Deputy Director. In March 2006, the PI and his colleagues, in partnership with the French Centre National de Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), established a joint research center dedicated to international collaborations in secure networks and advanced materials, the first such center of its kind in France. This center hosts fifteen people and ten projects from four institutions. The wireless portion of this proposal will be done in collaboration with colleagues at the University of Porto (J. Barros) and Cambridge University (M. Rodrigues). The international component of our project creates opportunities and challenges. For example, the landscape for recruiting and educating graduate students today is characterized by i) decreases in the students applying to US universities, particularly from China and India, and ii) a lack of US students getting meaningful engineering educational and research experience outside the US. We believe this project, coupled with the GTL campus in France, can address some of these challenges and help create future engineers, educators and researchers with a more global perspective. The broader impact of this project has two dimensions: i) global connections with a pathway to commercialization of new wireless security concepts; and ii) new models for training graduate students across national boundaries. The students and faculty would participate in new and long-lasting international research and educational activities. These students will have a much more global perspective, have the opportunity to interact on a long-term basis with European students and faculty, and the project would serve to identify (for companies, universities and government agencies) outstanding people with a global perspective. This model addresses the changing landscape and needs of student and faculty in the US and abroad. The intellectual merit is in new approaches to physical layer communications, from both theoretical and practical perspectives. The notion of a highly secure and reliable physical layer has the potential to significantly change how people think of the physical layer. The error control codes in this work will have the dual roles of reliability and security, adding a new dimension to a subject that has been studied extensively for more than 60 years. We believe the research presented here will result in changes in how classical communication systems are perceived and used, and is the next natural step in higher performance, physical layer communication systems.