Research Projects

Current Projects:

• SEEDS: A holistic design of secure vehicular networks: communications, data caching and blockchain services (Local Coordinator)

With the rapid development of future connected vehicles, Cyber Security has been gaining increasing importance to the connected systems that are fundamental to our society, health and welfare. It will be given priority to the upcoming areas, including autonomous systems and cyber-physical systems, etc. The SEEDS project sets an ambitious research agenda to fully exploit the potentials of V2X communications, data caching and blockchain services for revolutionizing the security and privacy of vehicular networks. Particularly the overall aim of SEEDS is to accelerate the transfer and deployment of research knowledge between European countries and third-country (TC) partners in order to realize a cross-layer design of reliable and robust security for V2X networks, and meet the challenging security requirements, that is confidentiality, integrity, privacy-preserving, trust and scalability. The technical approach is seeking is two-fold. One is to pursue a new design of spectrum efficient and decentralized approaches to address security challenges in physical layer communications and upper layer content disseminations by fully exploring the practical and theoretical analysis, dynamic nature of channels/traffic patterns and self-learning techniques, which provides the theoretic aspect of the project. Then, the second step is from the practical aspect, where the proposed security methods and their performance will be validated using large scale simulations and testbed provided by the TC partners. The proposed vehicular mechanisms are expected to facilitate an increasing number of vehicular applications with flexible availability, high confidentiality and robust integrity.

Start date: 1 March 2021

Duration: 48 months

Sponsoring body: H2020 MSCA RISE, G. A. n.º 101006411

Past Projects:

• Mission-Critical and Intelligent Communication Protocols for Future Vehicles Using Power Lines (Researcher)

This project is motivated by the emerging vehicular power line communications (VPLC) technology that can support vehicle communications, especially in future vehicles with highly sophisticated electronic systems, with reduced data wiring and cost. The focus of the project is in-vehicle communications which lays a key foundation of automotive electronics to provide pervasive and seamless connectivity between in-vehicle components and deliver mission-critical services. Today's vehicles have more than 2,000 wires, which would measure more than a mile in length. The weight of a wire harness is between 20 and 50 kilograms per car, which makes up the third heaviest and costliest component in a car, right behind the chassis and engine. To cope with the future vehicle communications, vehicle manufactures are always on the lookout for simplified approaches of reducing complexity, weight and cost.

Start date: 1 May 2017

Duration: 17 months

Sponsoring body: EPSRC (EP/P025862/1)

• Bionic communications and networking for connected vehicles (Researcher)

Start date: 1 May 2017

Duration: 24 months

Sponsoring body: Royal Society-Newton Mobility Grant (IE160920)

• Selfish and Malicious Behavior in Vehicular Delay-Tolerant Networks (Researcher)

Start date: 1 November 2012

Duration: 6 months

Sponsoring body: FCT (PEst-OE/EEI/LA0021/2011)

• MPsat – Multi-Packet Detection Techniques for Satellite Networks (Researcher)

Future satellite communications systems face a challenge to provide higher bitrates, together with improved QoS (quality of service) guarantees, to more GT (ground terminals). Moreover, this should be achieved with higher spectral and power efficiencies, with less energy. This project considers future very high bitrate LEO (Low Earth Orbit) satellite systems with satellite MPR (multipacket reception), compatible with low-cost portable GTs. A cross-layered approach is proposed: a physical layer team will handle the signal design, the synchronization and estimation issues, and the receiver design, including MPR development; a data link layer team will handle the Multiple Access control protocol design and the scheduling algorithm to support different QoS (Quality of Service) classes, and the interaction with the network layers. Both teams will be involved in the design and test of the cross-layering features involving both layers, required to provide guaranteed QoS, even during satellite handover.

Start date: 1 February 2010

Duration: 40 months

Sponsoring body: FCT (PTDC/EEA-TEL/099074/2008)

• Euro-NF: Anticipating the Network of the Future - From Theory to Design (Researcher)

Start date: 1 January 2008

Duration: 48 months

Sponsoring body: IST - 7th FP NoE, Contract 216366