A Periodic Space of Distributed Computing: Vision and Framework

This paper proposes a ‘Periodic Space’ for organizing the distributed computing landscape across two dimensions: a tiers continuum and abstraction levels. Analogous to the chemical periodic table, the framework characterizes system properties like responsiveness and elasticity, and anticipates future trends toward high-abstraction, high-tier agentic and Sky computing.

April 2026 · Mohsen Amini Salehi, Adel Toosi, Hai Duc Nguyen, Murtaza Rangwala, Omer Rana, Tevfik Kosar, Valeria Cardellini, Rajkumar Buyya