Policy-controlled dynamic spectrum access in multitiered mobile networks

Managed mobile ad hoc networks, such as tactical networks, are frequently implemented using multiple subnets, or tiers, so that nodes in one tier can communicate to nodes in another tier only through gateways that can communicate in both tiers. This structure imposes an extra burden on network planning personnel to plan and configure appropriate nodes as gateways between tiers taking into account the connectivity between tiers required to meet communication needs and the robustness required to deal with failures and mobility. This paper presents Net Communication Goals—a policy for specifying connectivity between tiers—and an implementation of a system for enforcing these policies. Using Net Communication Goals, or net goals, network planning personnel need only specify the required number of connections between tiers. These policies are then dynamically enforced within each tier, reconfiguring the frequencies used by network nodes to provide dynamic access to different parts of the available spectrum, thereby automatically maintaining the needed connectivity without manual intervention.