NSF IUCRC WISPER

The National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded funding to a partnership between Virginia Tech, the University of Arizona, and George Mason University, and facilitated by the Commonwealth Cyber Initiative (CCI), to create WISPER, an Industry-University Cooperative Research Center (IUCRC) focused on pioneering transformative 6G wireless and networking technologies.

WISPER (Wireless Innovation towards Secure, Pervasive, Efficient and Resilient NextG Networks) is the first NSF IUCRC devoted to this area of 6G research.

Mission

The WISPER research center will coordinate a concerted effort between academia and industry to bring transformative research on 6G wireless and networking technologies, founded on world-class faculty, cutting-edge research facilities, and workforce development. The partnership, facilitated by CCI, will include experts from Virginia Tech, the University of Arizona, and George Mason University.

With WISPER, the partnership aims to:

Grow U.S. competitiveness and innovation capacity in Next G wireless by developing close, sustained partnerships among leading industry innovators and world-class academic researchers.
Identify key drivers and barriers across societal and technological requirements and catalyze breakthrough pre-competitive research to enable secure, pervasive, efficient, and resilient Next G.
Contribute to the emerging North American vision for the next generation of networks, currently being coordinated by the Next G Alliance.
Train a workforce that’s prepared to tackle complex Next G challenges.
Conduct breakthrough, pre-competitive research with social and economic impact in four key research thematic areas.

Research Themes

We envision research in:

OpenG, a 6G that leverages virtualization, disaggregation, open interfaces, and open-source software to spur innovation, achieve efficiencies, and increase reliability through network sharing.
SmartG, an AI-native and more sustainable 6G, in which some network management and functions are initially supported by, and eventually fully replaced with, AI.
SpectrumG, a 6G that embraces various forms of spectrum sharing and reconfiguration, with access to new millimeter-wave and sub-THz bands.
SecureG, a 6G that incorporates new technologies and spectrum bands in a secure-by-design and resilient manner.

Industry Membership

Industry members will provide annual contributions toward the research program, and an Industry Advisory Board (IAB), made up of industry members, will recommends which faculty research projects to fund.

Full industry member benefits will include: