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An undergraduate internetwork, security-teaching laboratory, which includes both defensive and offensive security laboratory experimentation, is described. This laboratory is oriented toward an introductory internetworking security class and is intended to complement more theoretical network security classes while sparking student interest. The laboratory is unique in that it uses an isolated laboratory network that provides a simple model of the Internet, including an enterprise network component, a university component, a 'good' Internet service provider, and a 'bad' Internet service provider. This setup is in contrast to typical educational laboratories, which use only a few physical computers with virtual machines. All of the laboratory assignments are available on the Internet for general community use and modification (the Internetwork Security Class Home Page is available at http://users.ece.gatech.edu/~owen/). Index Terms--Computer network security, educational technology, laboratories.

We report on an innovative reconfigurable antenna concept with significant practical relevance based on the dynamic definition of metal-like conductive plasma channels in high-resistivity silicon that are activated by the injection of dc current. The plasma channels are precisely formed and addressed using current high-resolution silicon fabrication technology. These dynamically defined plasma-reconfigurable antennas enable frequency hopping, beam shaping, and steering without the complexity of RF feed structures. This concept shows promise for delivering the performance and capabilities of a phased array, but at a reduced cost. However, challenges such as p-i-n biasing circuit complexity and their nonlinearities, as well as antenna efficiency, would still require further investigations. Index Terms--Holographic antennas, plasma antennas, reconfigurable antennas, silicon, SPIN devices.

An undergraduate engineering internetworking learning environment that presents both internetworking principles and laboratory experimentation is described. The learning environment uses the source code availability of the Linux operating system as a case study of the implementation issues and ramifications of internet networking infrastructures. Laboratory use of experimentation with internetworking equipment and software allows interaction with internetworking principles and fundamentals as well as implementation and performance issues. The objectives of this environment include providing a comprehensive mechanism whereby students are exposed to fundamentals and principles that may readily be applied to experimental-based internetwork research and internetwork product development. A follow-on capstone design environment is also briefly described. Index Terms--Capstone design class, design projects, internet infrastructure experimentation, internetworking laboratory, undergraduate networking.

A senior-level design laboratory course is described, in which an optical fiber communication network is expanded or improved by successive generations of students. In this evolutionary approach, student teams base their work on the final written reports of students in previous course offerings. In addition to its primary goal of providing a high-level technical experience, the course requires multidisciplinary teamwork and provides incentive for the development of effective oral and written communication skills. Results of four offerings of the course are presented. Index Terms - Capstone design, fiber optics, interdisciplinary design, optical communications.

This paper describes a new two-quarter undergraduate capstone design class in our computer engineering curriculum. Design groups comprised of students from several different areas of specialization [e.g., software systems, very large scale integration (VLSI) devices and circuits, and computer architecture] design, simulate, implement, and evaluate a complete computing system. Typical examples of projects in the current sequence include a pipelined 32-bit RISC processor, a four-cell systolic array processor, and a video game. The goal is to produce simulation and hardware/software codesign as early as possible in the design process. Students execute software on simulation models prior to any hardware implementation. An assembler and a compiler are developed for the new design. Throughout the sequence, students participate in design reviews and must provide documentation of their designs. The final designs are implemented using an array of field programmable gate arrays (FPGA's) contained in a device called a hardware emulator. This allows for ease of design modifications while still having actual hardware for experimentation. Index Terms - Emulation, FPGA's, hardware/software codesign, rapid prototyping, VHDL.

A major technology barrier to the application of pulse compression techniques in meteorological radar is the presence of range sidelobes which mask and corrupt observations of weak weather phenomena in areas of strong extended meteorological scatterers or point target returns. Techniques for suppressing range sidelobes are well known, but without prior knowledge of the scattering medium's velocity distribution their performance degrades rapidly in the presence of doppler. Recent investigations have presented a 'doppler tolerant' range sidelobe suppression technique. The thrust of the work described herein is the extension of previous simulations to the transmission of dispersed/coded waveform pulses using the ELDORA X-Band weather research radar located at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Foothills Laboratory. This study shows that the use of Barker coded pulses along with pulse compression and doppler tolerant range sidelobe suppression provides: 1) increased sensitivity over a simple pulse of the same peak power, and nominal receive bandwidth by a factor equal to the time-bandwidth product, and 2) accurate spectral moment estimates.

The annual G7 Economic Summits, contrary to the claims of Fred Bergsten, have made progress in protecting and advancing a freer world market despite some unsolved problems. This is manifested by a comparison of the global economy between the pre-war and post-war eras. Some measures that Bergsten proposed regarding action to control global currency fluctuations may soon be realized due to recent improvements in the European economy. Thus, the G7 summits should be supported because of its potential in keeping a global economy together.

Experts in economics elucidate the reasons for the US dollar's failure to strengthen its place against the Yen and major European currencies since 1993. Markets do not always indicate economic fundamentals as shown by the dollar's weakness, and the causes of the weakness are obscure. The Clinton Administration's compliant policy does not guarantee the radical and smooth adjustment of the dollar to its long-run determinants of value. Experts indicate the sharp fall of the dollar against the Deutsche Mark and Yen is due to speculative transactions and high expectations of a strong dollar. The US has to reduce deficits and increase savings to restore the dollar's lost credibility.

Economists state that the policy oriented states of the current world are not different from the world of the 1930s as the demand, increase of interest rates and the policies of the ERM are similar to the gold standard of the yesteryears. Some economists opine that the G7 summit agenda needs to be reviewed to incorporate changes that will ensure fast and better growth. The G7 summit resembles the policies of the 1930s to a very large extent, and if left at it's own pace, would lead to another 'Great Depression.'

The Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) has developed a course, Technology Entrepreneurship, that combines the process-oriented strengths of engineering with entrepreneurial skills. Entrepreneurial education is not just for students who hope to create their own company. It is also for those who want to succeed as intrapreneurs-engineers working within a company to develop innovative products or services. Our goal is to provide the necessary foundation of vocabulary, knowledge, skills, and experience to succeed as an entrepreneur or intrapreneur. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Europe has not been able to equal or even surpass the economic performance of the US due to the absence of a transcontinental railroad system. This system is needed for the efficient delivery of goods all over the region. Moreover, the public nature of existing national railroads in Europe has stifled the acquisition of high-tech freight trains. Policymakers have identified private financing as the only solution for the said problem.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) will be affected by decisions made at the Helsinki Summit. President Bill Clinton has stated that the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary should become NATO members, and concessions have not been made to Russia, though these were expected. Russia has not been promised that other East and Central European countries will be excluded from NATO. Many Russians prefer to take their own route rather than seeking an unequal relationship with western countries. This view is respected by the Helsinki Summit, which also leaves western countries free to decide on their on groupings.

The year 1995 will probably be a period of transition in Europe as economic liberalization will usher in a free trade era and efforts for a single currency will continue among EU countries. The economic condition of individual EU countries, however will not relate to EU trend as a whole. There will be a problem of unemployment as they will not be able to keep pace with external liberalization. EU-US ties will suffer due to lesser US interest in Europe and weakening US economy. Visegrad countries will not get admission in NATO and their economies will grow but at different rates.

Silvery bladderpod (Lesquerella ludoviciana) is an endangered plant in Illinois where plants are at the eastern edge of their geographic range, occurring in blowout areas of recovering sand prairies at the Henry Allan Gleason Nature Preserve. Little is known about its reproductive potential in these areas. The objective of this study was to characterize population size, production of reproductive structures, and viability of seeds. In June 1999, three populations were identified within the Preserve. For each population, plants with and without fruits (no flowers present) were counted, and population areas were determined. Seedstalks/plant, fruits/seedstalk, and seeds/fruit were counted. Seeds were germinated on filter paper in Petri dishes at 25C. The three populations varied in size from 275 to 2050 m2 with a total area of nearly 3000 m2. Plant numbers were 900, 225, and 10,300 in the smallest, intermediate, and largest areas, respectively. The percentage of reproductive plants was lowest (28%) in the largest area and highest (88%) in the smallest area. Reproductive plants produced 6.5 seedstalks/plant (from 1 to 20). An average of 17.3 fruits/seedstalk (from 0 to 43) and 2.4 seeds/fruit (from 0 to 7) were produced. On seedstalks, seeds matured first on the lower part and last on the upper part. Total seed production for all three populations was estimated at nearly 1,200,000 seeds. Seeds germinated without any treatments to break dormancy. In summary, reproductive potential does not appear to be limited by seed production or by seed viability. Rather, reproductive potential in silvery bladderpod must be limited by other factors.

The concatenation of an equalizer and a Viterbi decoder is a powerful means for improving receiver performance in wireless communication systems. A soft-output equalizer increases the impact of this combination by enabling the use of soft-decision Viterbi decoding. It is well known that the maximum a posteriori (MAP) algorithm provides optimal reliability information, but at the cost of substantial complexity. This paper contains the results of an investigation into the design and performance of soft-output adaptive equalization techniques based on suboptimum trellis-based soft-output decoding algorithms. It is shown that the performance improvement relative to hard output equalizers is substantial, while the cost in terms of complexity is modest. A time-division multiple-access (TDMA) cellular system is used as the basis for comparisons. Simulation results and a complexity analysis are presented. Index Terms--Adaptive equalization, fading channel, MAP algorithm, modified-MAP algorithm, soft output, SOVA, SSA, TDMA, Viterbi decoder.

Rogue access points (RAPs) are unauthorized devices connected to a network, providing unauthorized wireless access to one or more clients. Such devices pose significant risk to organizations, since they provide a convenient means for hackers and insiders to hide malicious or unsanctioned activities on industry, government, and campus networks. Yet, limitations inherent in traditional networks make detecting and removing such devices expensive, time consuming, and difficult to implement. For software-defined networks (SDNs), the risk of a network compromise due to RAPs is equally concerning, and methods for detecting RAPs within SDN architectures are needed. Hence, this paper leverages the capabilities of an SDN along with a trusted agent to detect and deny RAPs access to networks by using both generic and novel methods with minimal impact to performance. Three other contributions are included in this paper. They include: 1) utilizing an emerging Web architecture to detect hidden subnets; 2) developing the first, security-based, use case for Mininet-WiFi, a software-defined wireless network emulator; and 3) enhancing Ryuretic, a modular programming language for SDN application development. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

There are a number of European policies that will tend to hinder economic growth, such as regulations, high labor costs resulting from social benefits, and higher government spending levels. European governments should seek to understand why companies might want to boost production and investment. A number of factors are important such as tax burdens, wage costs, international trade prospects, and sensible banking sysh is achieved, and governments should thus pursue the goal of growth. Political relations in Europe will be better if economic growt is achieved,

The economic growth of Eastern Germany's Saxony province under the leadership of Kurt Biedenkopf could be a model for other provinces. Biedenkopf was able to attract foreign investors by addressing potential problems such as training, wages and government regulations. Aside from preparing well trained employees and managers, he also talked with unions to enable flexibility in wages. To eliminate obstacles in government agencies, he shortened licensing to only a few months of processing.