Lixin Gao
University of Massachusetts, MA·Computer Science
The Internet is a network of thousands of independently run networks, and interdomain routing is what lets them exchange traffic. Its standard protocol, the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP), has long-known problems.
- Fields
Computer Science
Engineering
- Topics
interdomain routing
Border Gateway Protocol
software-defined networking
- Grants
- 1 known grant, last ended Sep 2026
What they work on
- Design and implement CIRCA, a logically centralized architecture that offloads BGP route computation from thin-client routers to a cloud service, and release it as an open-source prototype.
- Demonstrate that cloud-based interdomain routing is feasible at Internet scale, by analyzing and evaluating CIRCA's design.
- Quantify CIRCA's benefits over standard BGP, including reduced convergence delays, improved end-to-end reachability, more expressive routing policies and what-if analysis capabilities.
- Evaluate whether centralizing interdomain route computation improves security against attacks on the routing control plane.
More about the research
Routes can become briefly unavailable, it has security weaknesses, it is hard to manage, and it is difficult to change. Because nearly everyone relies on the Internet, improving how this routing works could make the whole system more robust and secure.
Why it matters
Network operators and anyone who depends on the Internet could benefit from interdomain routing that recovers faster from changes, keeps destinations reachable, resists attacks on the routing system, and is easier to manage and upgrade. An open-source prototype could give operators and researchers a practical way to test and adopt fixes to BGP's long-standing problems.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Kenneth Calvert
University of Kentucky, KY·Computer Science
Determine where and how to connect Named-data Networking (NDN), which fetches data by name, inside a network domain with SCION, a secure routing system that carries traffic between domains.
Xiaowei Yang
Duke University, NC·Computer Science
Use randomized algorithms to reduce the number of BGP (Border Gateway Protocol) experiments needed to predict anycast catchments, the set of users routed to each replica site.
David Choffnes
Northeastern University, MA·Computer Science
Design a system that lets network operators state routing goals, or intents, such as better performance or avoiding certain countries, and automatically configures routing announcements to control how traffic enters their network.
The school
University of Massachusetts: 28 labs on PI Pages, $282M a year on research, 337 research doctorates a year.
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