This article presents a unified computing, caching, and communication (3C) solution for the upcoming 5G environment that will allow service, content, and function providers to deploy their services/ content/functions near the end users (EUs); to allow network providers to virtually deploy their connectivity services over commodity hardware; and to enable end users to renounce their role as passive 5G stakeholders and become active ones by offering their 3C resources to the 5G ecosystem. In this direction, we foresee the exploitation of a peer-topeer- like middleware/app solution that upon installation will enhance the end user devices with the ability to form virtual fogs capable of providing their 3C resources to the 5G ecosystem. Additionally, we propose the introduction of heterogeneous nodes (e.g., FPGAs and GPUs) at the networks edge, which will boost the processing capabilities without paying a premium in power consumption. This will enable efficient and thorough filtering of the information that makes it all the way up to the cloud. In summary, this article proposes an architecture that exploits and advances the edge and extreme edge 3C paradigms toward enabling the 5G ecosystem to meet its own criterion for low end-to-end latencies and, as such, enable it to provide and sustain high QoS/QoE levels.

Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) is a concept, which has attracted significant attention as a promising approach towards the virtualization/“softwarisation” of network infrastructures. With the aim of promoting NFV, this paper outlines an integrated architecture, designed and developed within the context of the EU FP7 T-NOVA project, which allows network operators not only to deploy virtualized Network Functions (NFs) for their own needs, but also to offer them to their customers, as value-added services (Network Functions as-a-Service, NFaaS). Virtual network appliances (gateways, proxies, firewalls, transcoders, analyzers etc.) can be provided on-demand as-a-Service, eliminating the need to acquire, install and maintain specialized hardware at customers' premises. A “NFV Marketplace” is also introduced, where network services and functions created by a variety of developers can be published, acquired and instantiated on-demand.

Against the background of the unprecedented advancements related to Industry 4.0 and beyond, transitioning from classical mathematical models to fully embodied digital twins represents a critical change in the planning, monitoring, and optimization of complex industrial systems. This work outlines the subject within the broader field of applied mathematics and computational simulation while highlighting the critical role of sound mathematical foundations, numerical methodologies, and advanced computational tools in creating data-informed virtual models of physical infrastructures and processes in real time. The discussion includes examples related to smart manufacturing, additive manufacturing technologies, and cyber–physical systems with a focus on the potential for collaboration between physics-informed simulations, data unification, and hybrid machine learning approaches. Central issues including a lack of scalability, measuring uncertainties, interoperability challenges, and ethical concerns are discussed along with rising opportunities for multi/macrodisciplinary research and innovation. This work argues in favor of the continued integration of advanced mathematical approaches with state-of-the-art technologies including artificial intelligence, edge computing, and fifth-generation communication networks with a focus on deploying self-regulating autonomous digital twins. Finally, defeating these challenges via effective collaboration between academia and industry will provide unprecedented society- and economy-wide benefits leading to resilient, optimized, and intelligent systems that mark the future of critical industries and services.

Currently there is an active debate about how the existing cloud paradigm can cope with the volume, variety, and velocity of the data generated by end devices (e.g., Internet of Things sensors). It is expected that there will be over 50 billion of these devices by 2020, which will create more than two Exabytes worth of data each day. Additionally, the vast number of edge devices create a huge ocean of digital resources close to the data source, which, however, remain so far unexploited to their full extent. EXEGESIS proposes to harness these unutilized resources via a three-layer architecture that encompasses the mist, fog, and cloud. The mist network is located at the very bottom, where interconnected objects (Internet of Things devices, small servers, etc.) create neighborhoods of objects. This arrangement is enhanced by a virtual fog layer, which allows for dynamic, ad hoc interconnections among the various neighborhoods. At the top layer resides the cloud with its abundant resources that can also be included in one or more virtual fog neighborhoods. Thus, this article complements and leverages existing cloud architectures, enabling them to interact with this new edge-centric ecosystem of devices/resources, and benefit from the fact that critical data are available where they can add the most value.

Traditionally, emergency communications between citizens and public authorities relied on legacy telecommunication technologies unable to cope with the agile, rich-media-content communications that mobile users are already using. This is due to the lack of harmonization and interoperable IP-based networking solutions. With the operators currently migrating to broadband IP infrastructures, emergency systems also need to follow this path and adapt their emergency communication platforms to fulfill next generation emergency services regulatory requirements. This becomes even more evident in light of the forthcoming 5G networks, which are envisioned to support an amalgam of diverse applications and services with heterogeneous performance requirements, including mission-critical IoT communication, massive machine-type communication, and gigabit mobile connectivity. Emergency service operators face an enormous challenge in order to synchronize their model of operation with the 5G paradigm. This article studies the challenges that next generation emergency services need to overcome in order to fulfill the requirements for rich-content, real-time, location-specific communications. The concept for next generation emergency communications as described in the project EMYNOS is presented, along with a vision of how this concept can fulfill the 5G requirements for ultra-reliable and ultra-low-latency emergency communications.