AiroLAB: Leveraging on virtualization to introduce controlled experimentation in operational multi-hop wireless networks

Network Virtualization represents one of the most promising approach to unlock innovation in current network technologies. This paper presents AiroLAB, a wireless network virtualization solution aimed at providing Wireless Internet Service Providers with an effective tool to support experimental testing of novel network–level solutions on production networks. In the paper, the design choices which lie at the basis of AiroLAB are presented and discussed together with a prototype implementation. The outcomes of measurement activities performed on a small–scale testbed demonstrate the strength of the proposed framework in preserving guaranteed performance for production traffic while allowing several experimental instances to run on a network in operation.