Leveraging Generative AI for large-scale prediction-based networking

Abstract: The traditional role of the network layer is to create an end-to-end route, through which the intermediate nodes replicate and forward the packets towards the destination. This role can be radically redefined by exploiting the power of Generative AI (GenAI) to pivot towards a prediction-based network layer, which addresses the problems of throughput limits and uncontrollable latency. In the context of real-time delivery of image content, the use of GenAI-aided network nodes has been shown to improve the flow arriving at the destination by more than 100%. However, to successfully exploit GenAI nodes and achieve such transition, we must provide solutions for the problems which arise as we scale the networks to include large amounts of users and multiple data modalities other than images. We present three directions that play a significant role in enabling the use of GenAI as a network layer tool at a large scale. In terms of design, we emphasize the need for initialization protocols to select the prompt size efficiently. Next, we consider the use case of GenAI as a tool to ensure timely delivery of data, as well as an alternative to traditional TCP congestion control algorithms.