Sparse Regeneration in Translucent Wavelength-Routed Optical Networks: Architecture,Network Design and Wavelength Routing

In this paper we study an alternate network architecture, called translucent network, to the fully transparent and fully opaque network architectures. In a translucent wavelength-routed optical network, a technique called sparse regeneration is used to overcome the severe lightpath blocking due to signal quality degradation and wavelength contention in a fully transparent network while using much less regenerators than in a fully opaque network. In this paper, we present a node model and a network model that perform sparse regeneration. We address the problem of translucent network design by proposing several regenerator placement algorithms based on different knowledge of future network traffic patterns. We also address the problem of wavelength routing under sparse regeneration by incorporating two regenerator allocation strategies with heuristic wavelength routing algorithms. We compare the performance of different regenerator placement algorithms and wavelength routing schemes through simulation experiments. The benefit of sparse regeneration is quantitatively measured under different network settings.This work was supported by NSF grants (ANI-0074121 and EPS-0091900).Portions of this work have appeared in the Proceedings of the OSA Optical Fiber Communications (OFC 1999) Conference [6] and the Proceedings of the IEEE Global Telecommunications (GLOBECOM 2001) Conference [12].     

Dynamic circuit provisioning in all-optical WDM networks using lightpath switching

In this paper we investigate the problem of provisioning holding-time-aware (HTA) dynamic circuits in all-optical wavelength division multiplexed (WDM) networks. We employ a technique called lightpath switching (LPS) wherein the data transmission may begin on one lightpath and switch to a different lightpath at a later time. Lightpath switches are transparent to the user and are managed by the network. Allowing LPS creates a number of segments that can use independent lightpaths. We first compare the performance of traditional routing and wavelength (RWA) assignment to routing and wavelength assignment with LPS. We show that LPS can significantly reduce blocking compared to traditional RWA. We then address the problem of routing dynamic anycast HTA dynamic circuits. We propose two heuristics to solve the anycast RWA problem: anycast with continuous segment (ACS) and anycast with lightpath switching (ALPS). In ALPS we exercise LPS, and provision a connection request by searching for the best candidate destination node is such a way that the network resources are utilized efficiently. In ACS we do not allow a connection request to switch lightpaths. The lightpaths to each candidate destination node of a request are computed using traditional RWA algorithms. We first compare the performance of ACS to ALPS and observe that ALPS achieves better blocking than ACS. Furthermore, we also compare the performance of these two anycast RWA algorithms to the traditional unicast RWA algorithm. We show that the anycast RWA algorithms presented here significantly outperform the traditional unicast RWA algorithms.     

Post‐Disaster least loaded lightpath routing in elastic optical networks

Disaster events directly affect the physical topology of core networks and may lead to simultaneous failure of multiple lightpaths leading to massive service outages for network operators. To recover from such a failure scenario, the existing routing algorithms running on network nodes (routers or switches) typically attempt to reestablish the connections over new routes with shortest distances and hop count approach. However, this approach may result in congestion on some links, while other links may have the unutilized capacity. Hence, intelligent lightpath computing techniques are required to efficiently route network traffic over the new routes by considering traffic load of each link in addition to distance and hop count to minimize network congestion. In this paper, we have proposed a capacity‐constrained maximally spatial disjoint lightpath algorithm to tackle the provisioning and restoration of disrupted lightpaths in a postdisaster scenario in the context of elastic optical networking. This algorithm computes an alternate least loaded lightpath for disrupted primary lightpath using capacity‐constrained shortest lightpath. Alternate lightpath selection is based on a criteria parameter for a lightpath to be least loaded and constrained by either the length or the spatial distance between primary and alternate lightpaths. The spatial distance between lightpaths enables to reestablish the disrupted connection request away from disaster proximity. The performance of the proposed algorithm is evaluated through simulation for several parameters like blocking probability, network utilization, connection success rates, and minimum spatial distance.     

一种基于OBGP协议的光网络域间路由的新型机制

本文提出一种采用光边界网关协议(OBGP)实现WDM光格状网的域间路由的新型机制;该机制基于最小跳选择策略建立最优化路径的思想,同时引进"迂回路由"策略和"并行信令"方式,实现了动态、分布式的光通道确立过程.在OPNet平台上针对两种网络拓扑进行仿真实验,结果表明:该机制能够在网络繁忙时期降低阻塞率,提高网络性能;同时发现:网络规模、单信道波长数以及网络负载等网络参数对于网络性能具有一定的影响.     

A dynamic hop count shifting RWA algorithm for wavelength routed optical networks

In this article, we find that the limiting hop count in a lightpath impacts on the performance of optical networks. Based on this observation, we propose a dynamic hop count shifting (DYHOS) algorithm that limits the hop count of lightpaths dynamically, depending on the traffic load. The proposed algorithm searches an available route, while minimizing the waste of network resources and limiting excessive traffic on the network. Hence, the proposed algorithm increases the network throughput and reduces the blocking probability. Comparing with shortest path routing and adaptive path routing algorithms, we show the performance of the proposed algorithm has the lowest blocking probability influenced by the hop count of lightpaths for a given routing algorithm.

Distributed Dijkstra sparse placement routing algorithm for translucent optical networks

In this paper we study translucent optical networks as an alternative to fully transparent and fully opaque optical networks. In the former networks, a technique called sparse placement is used to overcome the lightpath blocking caused by the signal quality degradation, using much less regenerators, which must strategically be placed, in contrast to a fully opaque network. In this paper we propose a sparse placement algorithm based on two requirements. The first one is signal regeneration necessary to re-amplify, reshape, and retime the optical signals after some predefined transparent distance in order to successfully receive the signals at the destination node. The other is load balance of the traffic in the network aimed at efficient usage of the network capacity resources. We apply a distributed Dijkstra routing algorithm which dynamically changes weights of links during the process of locating regeneration capable nodes. We compare the performance of the proposed algorithm with commonly used sparse placement algorithms through simulation experiments. The benefits are such that load balancing of the network traffic is fully utilized, and with technological development it will be sufficient to equip up to 30% of nodes in the network with electronic regenerations in order to have the same performance as in an opaque network.

Dynamic light trail routing in WDM optical networks

Fiber optics have replaced copper as the primary transmission medium. Wavelength Division Multiplexing (WDM) networks effectively increase single-link bandwidth from 10 Mbps to over 160 Gbps, and have been considered as a promising candidate for the next-generation backbone network. All optical circuits each on a separate wavelength called lightpaths represent the first major method for optical communication. The granularity provided between a source and destination node is that of a complete wavelength. Once a lightpath is set up, the entire wavelength is used exclusively by the connection’s source and destination node-pair. No sub-wavelength sharing between nodes along the lightpath is allowed. However, it is often observed that the bandwidth requirement in today’s network is often dynamically varying and does not justify the need for allocating an entire wavelength. Therefore, the wavelength capacity may be underutilized. A new technology termed light trail was proposed to avoid the inability of intermediate nodes to use a connection wavelength, and the constant reconfiguration of switches. In this article, we study dynamic light trail routing in a WDM optical network. We present an efficient algorithm for establishing a light trail routing for a new connection request, while using minimum network resources. We also study survivable network routing using the proposed light trail technology. We present an efficient heuristic for computing a pair of working and protection light trails for a dynamic incoming connection request. Simulation results are presented which demonstrate the advantages of our routing schemes.     

Fixed point approximation for multirate multihop loss networks with state-dependent routing

In this paper we consider a class of loss networks that have arbitrary topologies and routes of arbitrary length. Multiple traffic classes are present, each with different bandwidth requirement, and each routed according to a state-dependent routing scheme. In particular, we consider the least loaded routing method generalized to routes of arbitrary number of hops. The connection level performance metric of interest is the end-to-end blocking probability. We are interested in developing fast evaluation methods to provide reasonably accurate estimates of the blocking probability, especially under heavy traffic load. Our algorithms are based on the fixed-point method framework, also known as the reduced load approximation. In addition to what commonly examined by previous work, two more factors contribute to the complexity of the computation in the scenario under consideration in this paper. One is the state-dependent nature of the routing mechanism, the other is the possible overlapping between routes due to the general multihop topology of the network. We present two fast approximation algorithms to evaluate the blocking probability with state-dependent routing by simplifying the route overlapping computation. We discuss the computational complexity of our algorithms as well as sources of approximation error. We then compare the numerical results with that of simulation and show that our algorithms provide fairly accurate blocking probability estimates especially under heavy traffic load.     

Algorithms for Dynamic Routing in All-Optical Networks

In this paper, we have studied a number of algorithms for routing in all-optical wavelength routed networks. We have considered situations where a lightpath is dynamically created in response to a request for communication and the WDM channels constituting the lightpath are reclaimed when the communication is over. We have looked at two schemes for dynamic wavelength allocation. In the first scheme we have assumed the existence of a central agent to maintain a database of existing lightpaths where the central agent attempts to generate a new lightpath in response to a request for communication. In the second scheme, we attempt to generate a new lightpath using a distributed algorithm. In the first scheme we have exploited the existence of multiple paths between any pair of nodes in a network in order to reduce the blocking probability. For the second scheme, we have proposed three distributed strategies to determine, if possible, a lightpath when there is a request for communication. Each of these strategies have their advantages and disadvantages in terms of the expected blocking probability and the set-up time. We have studied the performances of both the schemes using Monte Carlo simulation.     

On the performance of distributed lightpath provisioning with dynamic routing and wavelength assignment

Distributed lightpath provisioning in wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) networks has gained wide research interests. In this article, we study the performance of distributed lightpath provisioning in WDM networks with dynamic routing and wavelength assignment (RWA). Specifically, we consider the case where routing of each lightpath is calculated based on globally flooded link-state information, and wavelength assignment is decided through local information exchanges. Simulation results show that such schemes steadily outperform those schemes with only global flooding or only local information exchanges. More significantly, the impacts of various factors on the proposed scheme, including RWA algorithm, network topology, number of wavelengths per fiber, global flooding interval, and traffic load, have been evaluated. Such evaluations help to achieve some insights useful for the future developments of efficient lightpath provisioning schemes.

An Inter-domain Routing and Signaling Scheme for Optical Mesh Networks

An inter-domain routing and signaling scheme based on the OBGP protocol for WDM networks with a mesh topology is proposed in the paper. For mesh networks with wavelength conversion, inter-domain routing and signaling are realized by introducing a new message based on an optimal path identifier (OPI) and by establishing the corresponding message-exchange procedures. Considering the wavelength continuity constraint, a strategy called improved destination wavelength assignment (IDWA) combined with the OPI-based message is presented to establish a lightpath dynamically. The scheme is verified on the NSFNET and the CERNET by simulation. Results show that the blocking performance of a non-wavelength-conversion network is even a little lower than that of a wavelength-conversion network.     

Dynamic connection provisioning with shared protection in IP/WDM networks

Internet protocol (IP) traffic connections arrive dynamically at wavelength‐division multiplexing (WDM) network edges with low data rates compared with the wavelength capacity, availability, and quality‐of‐service (QoS) constraints. This paper introduces a scheme to be integrated into the control and management plane of IP/WDM networks to satisfy the availability and QoS required for IP traffic connections bundled onto a single wavelength (lightpath) in WDM networks protected by shared‐backup path protection (SBPP). This scheme consists of two main operations: (i) routing multi‐granular connections and traffic grooming policies, and (ii) providing appropriate shared protection on the basis of subscribers’ service‐level agreements in terms of data rate, availability, and blocking probability. Using the Markov chain process, a probabilistic approach is developed to conceive connection blocking probability models, which can quantify the blocking probability and service utilization of M:N and 1:N SBPP schemes. The proposed scheme and developed mathematical models have been evaluated in terms of bandwidth blocking ratio, availability satisfaction rate, network utilization, and connection blocking probability performance metrics. The obtained research results in this paper provide network operators an operational setting parameter, which controls the allocation of working and backup resources to dynamic IP traffic connections on the basis of their priority and data rate while satisfying their requirements in terms of bandwidth and availability. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Routing and wavelength assignment of scheduled lightpath demands

We present algorithms that compute the routing and wavelength assignment (RWA) for scheduled lightpath demands in a wavelength-switching mesh network without wavelength conversion functionality. Scheduled lightpath demands are connection demands for which the setup and teardown times are known in advance. We formulate separately the routing problem and the wavelength assignment problem as spatio-temporal combinatorial optimization problems. For the former, we propose a branch and bound algorithm for exact resolution and an alternative tabu search algorithm for approximate resolution. A generalized graph coloring approach is used to solve the wavelength assignment problem. We compared the proposed algorithms to an RWA algorithm that sequentially computes the route and wavelength assignment for the scheduled lightpath demands.     

Protection approaches for dynamic traffic in IP/MPLS-over-WDM networks

Due to the explosive growth of data-related traffic driven by the Internet, network reliability becomes an important issue. We investigate various protection approaches to handle failures for dynamic traffic demands in IP/MPLS-over-WDM networks. An LSP can be protected at either the IP/MPLS layer or the optical layer. In IP/MPLS layer protection, an LSP is protected by providing a link-disjoint backup LSP between its end nodes. In optical layer protection, an LSP is protected by the backup lightpath of each lightpath traversed by the LSP. We present two integrated routing algorithms: hop-based integrated routing algorithm and bandwidth-based integrated routing algorithm (BIRA) to set up the restorable bandwidth-guaranteed paths efficiently. Then we present a multilayer protection scheme for multiclass traffic in such networks. This scheme takes into account the different QoS and recovery requirements of the traffic to provide protection capability either at the MPLS layer or at the optical layer in a cost-effective manner. We use the connection blocking probability and number of optical-electrical-optical conversions as performance metrics to compare various protection approaches.     

Multicast wavelength assignment with sparse wavelength converters to maximize the network capacity using ILP formulation in WDM mesh networks

In general, multicast routing and wavelength assignment (MC-RWA) can be subdivided in routing and wavelength assignment issues in wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) mesh networks. Previous studies on WDM multicast have mainly focused on WDM multicast routing. The multicast wavelength assignment problem is studied in this paper. A unicast routing path can be established by a lightpath in an all-optical network. However, in the multicasting case, a multicast routing tree can be established by a single light-tree or several lightpaths, or a combination of several light-trees and lightpaths. We propose a wavelength assignment algorithm for finding an optimal combination of lightpaths and light-trees to construct a newly required multicast session. First of all, two cost functions are given to evaluate the establishing cost for each feasible wavelength, and then find a set of wavelengths that covers all destinations with the minimal cost using Integer Linear Programming (ILP) formulation. We focus on maximizing the total number of users served in a multicast session and the network capacity. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm can improve system resource utilization and reduce the blocking probability compared with the First-Fit algorithm.This research was partially supported by the Grant of National Science Council, R.O.C. (NSC 94-2745-E-155-007-URD).     

Modified Least Load Multicast Routings for Single Rate Fully-Connected Loss Networks

In this paper, we investigate the dynamic multicast routing problem and briefly discuss the common dynamic multicast routing algorithm called Least Load Multicast Routing (LLMR). We propose two new multicast routing algorithms called Least Load Multicast Routing with Maximum Occupied Circuits (LLMRMOC) and Least Load Multicast Routing with Minimum Measured Blocking Time (LLMRMMBT), both of which are based on LLMR. Simulation results show that these algorithms, compared with LLMR, not only produce a smaller network revenue loss, but also result in smaller call blocking probabilities for all classes of traffic. The moderate gain in the network performance comes only a slight additional cost. The implementation issues of the proposed algorithms are also discussed.     

Bandwidth‐guaranteed QoS routing of multiple parallel paths in CDMA/TDMA ad hoc wireless networks

This paper investigates the issues of QoS routing in CDMA/TDMA ad hoc networks. Since the available bandwidth is very limited in ad hoc networks, a QoS request between two nodes will be blocked if there does not exist a path that can meet the QoS requirements, even though there is enough free bandwidth in the whole system. In this paper, we propose a new scheme of using multiple paths between two nodes as the route for a QoS call. The aggregate bandwidth of the multiple paths can meet the bandwidth requirement of the call and the delays of these paths are within the required bound of the call. We also propose three strategies by which to choose a set of paths as the route, namely, shortest path first (SPF), largest bandwidth first (LBF), and largest hop‐bandwidth first (LHBF). Extensive simulations have been conducted to evaluate the performance of the three strategies in comparison with a traditional single path routing algorithm. The simulation results show that the proposed multiple paths routing scheme significantly reduces the system blocking rates in various network environments, especially when the network load is heavy. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

SLEA: a novel scheme for routing in overlay IP/WDM networks

This paper studies the routing problems in Internet protocol/wavelength-division-multiplexing (IP/WDM) networks based on the overlay routing algorithm (ORA) and the integrated routing algorithm (IRA), respectively. Although IRA usually outperforms ORA in terms of blocking performance, IRA exhibits disadvantages in control information exchange, network privacy issue, and wavelength port efficiency. In this paper, a new mechanism called the short lightpath establishment approach (SLEA) is proposed for ORA in order to tackle the problems in IRA and achieve similar (or even better) network performance at the same time. The main idea of SLEA is to ensure that each new lightpath created by ORA is restricted by an optical hop constraint when a subwavelength-granularity connection is routed in the optical layer. It follows that SLEA essentially avoids per-connection-based greedy treatment and improves network wide resource utilization by eliminating inefficient long optical bypasses. To implement SLEA in ORA, the Dijsktra's algorithm has been modified based on an extended layered graph model. SLEA does not introduce any additional signaling and computational complexity. The analysis and simulation in this paper show that there exists an optimal optical hop constraint for each particular network configuration such that SLEA-based ORA (SLEA-ORA) can efficiently utilize the network resource of concern. As a result, with the optimal optical hop constraint, SLEA-ORA could outperform ORA and IRA in terms of the bandwidth-blocking ratio (BBR) and the average number of IP hops of label-switched paths (LSPs).     

D-CAT: An Efficient Algorithm for Distributed Channel Allocation in Cellular Mobile Networks

We propose a distributed channel allocation algorithm based on a threshold scheme, called D-CAT, for cellular mobile networks. The algorithm employs two thresholds: (i) a heavy threshold for determining whether a cell is heavy, or overloaded, and for triggering the channel allocation algorithm; and (ii) a target threshold for indicating the target number of free channels that a heavy cell intends to acquire. Based on the two-threshold scheme, the D-CAT algorithm can determine the optimal number of free channels as well as the cell(s) from where a heavy cell should import channels in order to satisfy the required channel demand. Simulation experiments and analyses show that the proposed algorithm incurs lower overhead for channel allocation and is more efficient in terms of channel utilization than other distributed channel allocation algorithms. It also outperforms other centralized and distributed algorithms in terms of call blocking probability.