Molecular Processes as a Basis for Autonomous Networking

Autonomous networking has become the buzzword for attempts of building high-scalable network architectures, which are self-organizing, self-maintaining and self- healing. Few of these approaches were successful and none has shown to provide all the promised functions. We try to study the processes in computer networks using molecular processes as the paradigm. This novel approach shows many similarities between computer networking and cellular mechanisms. In this paper, we focus on the area of network security as one research area with high demand for high-scalable mechanisms providing the needed functionality. After identifying similarities between nature and technology, we discuss potential research domains, which are high potentials for learning directly from molecular biology using the example of security threats in communication networks. We see the proposed mechanism as a generic approach for autonomous networking. The countermeasures against attacks in computer networks are only a special example to introduce the mechanisms.