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     *                       CALL FOR PAPERS                      *

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     *                       ACCESSNETS 2008                      *

     *     Third International Conference on Access Networks      *

     *        October 15-17, 2008, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA         *

     *                 http://www.accessnets.org                  *

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OVERVIEW:

With the rapid growth of the Internet as well as the increasing demand for broadband services, access networks have been receiving growing investments in recent years. This has led to a massive network deployment with the goal of eliminating the bandwidth bottleneck between end-users and the network core. Today many diverse technologies are being used to provide broadband access to end users. The architecture and performance of the access segment (local loop, wired and wireless access networks, and even home networks) are getting increasing attention for ensuring quality of service of diverse broadband applications. Moreover, most access lines will no longer terminate on a single device, thus leading to the necessity of having a home network designed for applications that transcend simple Internet access sharing among multiple personal computers and enable multimedia support. Therefore, the access network and its home portion have become a hot investment pool from both a fin!

 ancial as well as a research perspective.

The aim of the annual International Conference on Access Networks (AccessNets) is to provide a forum that brings together scientists and researchers from academia as well as managers and engineers from the industry and government organizations to meet and exchange ideas and recent work on all aspects of access networks and how they integrate with their in-home counterparts. AccessNets'08 is the third edition of this exciting event, which will be held in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, on Oct. 15-17 2008. The conference will consist of technical sessions, workshops, and panels. The technical sessions will present original and fundamental research advances while the workshops and panels will focus on development, application, and related business issues in this hot and exciting area.

TOPICS:

The conference solicits original technical papers that were not previously published and are not currently under review for publication elsewhere. Topics of interest include but are not limited to:

* FTTx and PON technologies

* xDSL technology and DSM

* Hybrid fiber coaxial (HFC) technology

* Cable-based access technology

* Powerline communication technology

* Digital satellite access technology

* WiFi and WiMax networks

* Wireless mesh networks

* Integrated wired/wireless networks

* Long reach Ethernet

* Home networks

* Networked appliances

* Hybrid wired/wireless LANs

* Municipal and community networks

* Network architectures and protocols

* Medium access control

* Cross-layer design

* OFDM, OFDMA, CDMA techniques

* MIMO techniques

* Service convergence

* Quality of service provisioning

* Network scalability and upgradeability

* Network survivability and security

* Billing and management aspects

* Business and regulatory aspects

* Deployment/standardization statuses

PANELS AND WORKSHOPS:

We solicit panel and workshop proposals on hot and controversial topics in access networks. Proposals should be submitted to the panel and workshop co-chairs, respectively. Please visit the conference website for detailed instructions.

PAPER SUBMISSION:

Please visit the conference website (http://www.accessnets.org) for detailed instructions.

Paper Publication:

All submitted papers will go through a peer review process. All accepted papers will be included in the Proceedings of AccessNets 2008.

* Selected best papers will be considered for publication in a Special Issue on Broadband Access Networks of IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communincations.

* Selected outstanding papers will be considered for publication in Inderscience International Journal of Communication Networks and Distributed Systems.

* Selected outstanding papers will be considered for publication in Inderscience International Journal of Autonomous and Adaptive Communications Systems.

IMPORTANT DATES:                  

Paper submission due                    April 1, 2008

Notification of acceptance              June 15, 2008

Final manuscript due                    July 15, 2008

Workshop proposal due                   April 1, 2008

Notification of acceptance              April 15,2008

Panel proposal due                      April 1, 2008

Notification of acceptance              April 15,2008

CONFERENCE ORGANIZING COMMITTEE

GENERAL CHAIR

Hussein T. Mouftah, University of Ottawa, Canada

TPC CO-CHAIRS

Jun Zheng, University of Ottawa, Canada

Pascal Lorenz, University of Haute Alsace, France

WORKSHOP CO-CHAIRS

Tarek S. El-Bawab, Jackson State University, USA

Ting Wang, NEC Laboratories America, Inc., USA

PANEL CO-CHAIRS

Alex Vukovic, Communications Research Center, Canada

Wenye Wang, North Carolina State University, USA

Industry Track Chair

Frank Effenberger, Huawei Technologies, USA

PUBLICATION CHAIR

Chonggang Wang, University of Kansas, USA

PUBLICITY CO-CHAIRS

Yuanqiu Luo, Huawei Technologies, USA

Joao M. Santos, Nokia Siemens Networks, Portugal

Tarik Taleb, Tohoku University, Japan

IEEE LIAISON

Mei Yang, University of Nevada, USA

FINANCIAL CHAIR

Karen Decker, ICST

CONFERENCE COORDINATOR

Tibor Kovacs, ICST

LOCAL ARRANGEMENT CHAIR

Mei Yang, University of Nevada, USA

STEERING COMMITTEE

Imrich Chlamtac (Chair), Create-net, Italy

Jun Zheng, University of Ottawa, Canada

Nirwan Ansari, New Jersey Institute of Technology, USA

TECHNICAL PROGRAM COMMITTEE

See http://www.accessnets.org