Networking Technology and Systems (NeTS)

The Networking Technology and Systems (NeTS) program seeks fundamental scientific understanding of and advances in intelligent communication networks, including, but not limited to, edge, home, enterprise, data center, cloud, undersea cable, Internet or Internet-scale networks, and in the wireless areas of cellular, vehicular, mesh, sensor, body area, internet of things (IoT), aerial, spaceborne, and underwater networks, as well as networks spanning multiple domains and scales, e.g., space-air-ground integrated, hybrid wireless-wired, nano, and other networks, and application-aware and artificial intelligence (AI)-driven networking services that depend on communication networks. NeTS supports research in networking technologies including terabit or petabit Ethernet, optical, radio, acoustic, visible light, quantum, and bio-inspired communications/networking. NeTS seeks novel frameworks, architectures, protocols, algorithms, methodologies and experimental approaches including measurement and tools for the design and analysis, development, operation, and management of robust and intelligent networks, including AI-native networks that can learn, reason, adapt, perform tasks, make decisions, and solve problems automatically with minimal human intervention. The program also seeks projects that enable integrated sensing and communication, smart, secure, and energy-efficient network operation with low control and communication overhead. Interdisciplinary proposals related to communications and networking are welcome as well. Proposers should present a solid plan for verification, evaluation, and validation of the proposed techniques. The NeTS program encourages experimentation using NSF-funded infrastructure platforms when applicable.

Topics in the areas of wired, wireless, and integrated next-generation networks

Projects may explore fundamental principles and create innovative networking technologies, protocols, algorithms, and systems that define the future or realistically harness current and emerging technologies, trends, and applications. They may produce practical abstractions, techniques, tools, artifacts, or datasets that address/enhance both general and functional requirements. Network systems proposals are expected to demonstrate a clear understanding of what each component does and how it interfaces with the rest of the system and the environment.

Projects are not limited to the following topics. Rather, researchers are encouraged to address other pressing and challenging networking areas of research, including future networking possibilities. NeTS invites proposals in the broad areas of wired, wireless, and integrated next-generation networks. For example, the program:

• Supports research that addresses networking challenges that come with emerging technologies and the integration of various heterogeneous networks, including rethinking the protocol stack, developing novel networking paradigms, protocols, algorithms, routing mechanisms, and required new hardware and software approaches for networks enabled and demanded, for example, by optical, spaceborne, cellular, quantum, bio-inspired networking, and terabit to petabit Ethernet.
• Encourages new approaches to creating dependable autonomous, self-driving networks or self-healing networks, for example by replacing traditional methods with automated processes that can adapt to changes without causing instability, especially those based on AI, machine learning (ML) and emerging methods as well as the use of network verification. Projects may address full stack explainability including approaches where the provenance of every data/control flow dependency is well known.
• Funds research on holistic approaches to support efficient and dynamic resource allocation, utilization, and sharing; seek efficient and dynamic approaches to integrated sensing and communication, interference management and the coexistence of multiple co-located networks, potentially including different radio technologies and network protocols.
• Welcomes proposals that can address key questions relating to high throughput, low latency, pervasive connectivity, energy efficiency, manageability, availability, reliability, resilience, network security, cross-layer optimization, and develop new approaches for communication and networking such as semantic and task-oriented communications.
• Supports projects that focus on application-aware networking, such as video and data streaming to support large language models (LLMs), distributed learning, augmented reality/virtual/mixed reality (AR/VR/MR), cooperative perception, robot collaboration, big science, and complex biotech. 
• Funds projects that may include networking techniques where constrained physical infrastructure, applications and security characterize networking solutions such as in massive IoT systems and bio-inspired communication systems, or those which leverage knowledge from understanding the global Internet to improve and make more intelligent and resilient large-scale networked applications.
• Invites proposals that address research relevant to commercial trends that are expected to impact future networks such as cloud repatriation—where companies are moving their cloud service back in-house and require networks that are secure-by-construction, cost-efficient and agile. Another trend is multi-cloud networking which, for example, may leverage understanding and principles of the massive scale and distributed nature of the Internet in this context.
• Supports projects that address on-going trends such as in-network computing and storage, in-network machine learning, networking in disaggregated systems, and programmable networks. There is also a need to scale data centers and explore and mitigate the resulting networking roadblocks in hardware, software, and functionality through integrated designs, for example, in switches, memory, algorithms, and protocols.
• Supports networking projects that focus on systems with inherent built-in security and intelligence, such as networking for critical-infrastructure supervised control and data acquisition (SCADA) where verifiable networking is crucial.
• Supports projects focusing on end-to-end services that span edge to core to cloud, potentially integrating and optimizing across wired and wireless technologies and networks.  
• Welcomes proposals on theoretical approaches for the design and analysis of communication networks, including establishment of performance limits and characterization of achievable trade-offs.
• Supports research on wireless networks that utilize a multitude of emerging physical layer technologies. Examples include free-space quantum communication, massive multi-input multi-output (MIMO) antenna systems, millimeter wave (mmWave), terahertz (THz) and higher bands networking, intelligent surfaces, dynamic spectrum access systems, free-space optical and visible light communications, satellite, airborne and underwater communication platforms, and ultra-low latency, low-power wireless networks. 
• Seeks research on innovative higher-layer services that can be enabled by wireless communications, such as wireless localization, virtualization, mobile sensing, and dynamic spectrum measurement.

What is NOT within the scope of the NeTS program

The following research topics are typically not supported by the NeTS program and may be returned without review (RWR):

• Research that resides primarily at the device or application layer or is highly context specific.
• Transport network systems, unless the focus of the research is on an enabling communication network.
• Social networks, unless the research has a direct connection to communication networking research.
• Network science that does not specifically focus on an engineered communication network.
• Projects with sensors that do not explicitly focus on networking problems and challenges.