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).     

Performance analysis of multicast routing and wavelength assignment protocol with dynamic traffic grooming in WDM networks

The need for on‐demand provisioning of wavelength‐routed channels with service‐differentiated offerings within the transport layer has become more essential because of the recent emergence of high bit rate Internet protocol (IP) network applications. Diverse optical transport network architectures have been proposed to achieve the above requirements. This approach is determined by fundamental advances in wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) technologies. Because of the availability of ultra long‐reach transport and all‐optical switching, the deployment of all‐optical networks has been made possible. The concurrent transmission of multiple streams of data with the assistance of special properties of fiber optics is called WDM. The WDM network provides the capability of transferring huge amounts of data at high speeds by the users over large distances. There are several network applications that require the support of QoS multicast, such as multimedia conferencing systems, video‐on‐demand systems, real‐time control systems, etc. In a WDM network, the route decision and wavelength assignment of lightpath connections are based mainly on the routing and wavelength assignment (RWA). The multicast RWA's task is to maximize the number of multicast groups admitted or minimize the call‐blocking probability. The dynamic traffic‐grooming problem in wavelength‐routed networks is generally a two‐layered routing problem in which traffic connections are routed over lightpaths in the virtual topology layer and lightpaths are routed over physical links in the physical topology layer. In this paper, a multicast RWA protocol for capacity improvement in WDM networks is designed. In the wavelength assignment technique, paths from the source node to each of the destination nodes and the potential paths are divided into fragments by the junction nodes and these junction nodes have the wavelength conversion capability. By using the concept of fragmentation and grouping, the proposed scheme can be generally applied for the wavelength assignment of multicast in WDM networks. An optimized dynamic traffic grooming algorithm is also developed to address the traffic grooming problem in mesh networks in the multicast scenario for maximizing the resource utilization and minimizing the blocking probability. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Multicast Flow Aggregation in IP over Optical Networks

It is widely believed that IP over optical networks will be a major component of the next generation Internet However, it is not efficient to map a single multicast IP flow into one light-tree, since the bandwidth of an IP flow required is usually much less than that of a light-tree. In this paper, we study the problem of multicast flow aggregation (MFA) in the IP over optical two-layered networks under the overlay model, which can be defined as follows: given a set of head ends (i.e. optical multicasting sources), each of which can provide a set of contents (i.e. multicast IP flows) with different required transmission bandwidth, and a set of requested content at the access routers (i.e. optical multicasting destinations), find a set of light-trees as well as the optimal aggregation of multicast IP flows in each light-tree. We model MFA by a tri-partite graph with multiple criteria and show that the problem is NP-complete. Optimal solutions are designed by exploiting MFA to formulate an integer linear programming (ILP), with two parameters: the multicast receiving index alpha and the redundant transmitting index beta. We also propose a heuristic algorithm. Finally, we compare the performance of MFA for different combination of alpha and beta via experiments and show our heuristic algorithm is effective for large-scale network in numerical results     

The arrayed-waveguide grating-based single-hop WDM network: an architecture for efficient multicasting

Research on multicasting in single-hop wavelength-division-multiplexing (WDM) networks has so far focused on networks based on the passive star coupler (PSC), a broadcast device. It has been shown that multicasting performance is improved by partitioning multicast transmissions into multiple multicast copies. However, the channel bottleneck of the PSC, which does not allow for spatial wavelength reuse, restricts the multicast performance. We investigate multicasting in a single-hop WDM network that is based on an arrayed-waveguide grating (AWG), a wavelength routing device that allows for spatial wavelength reuse. In our network, optical multicasting is enabled by wavelength-insensitive splitters that are attached to the AWG output ports. Multicasts are partitioned among the splitters and each multicast copy is routed to a different splitter by sending it on a different wavelength. We demonstrate that the spatial wavelength reuse in our network significantly improves the throughput-delay performance for multicast traffic. By means of analysis and simulations, we also demonstrate that, for a typical mix of unicast and multicast traffic, the throughput-delay performance is dramatically increased by transmitting multicast packets concurrently with control information in the reservation medium access control protocol of our AWG-based network.     

Multiwavelength optical networks with limited wavelength conversion

This paper proposes optical wavelength division multiplexed (WDM) networks with limited wavelength conversion that can efficiently support lightpaths (connections) between nodes. Each lightpath follows a route in a network and must be assigned a channel on each link along the route. The load λ_max of a set of lightpaths is the maximum over all links of the number of lightpaths that use the link. At least λ_max wavelengths will be needed to assign channels to the lightpaths. If the network has full wavelength conversion capabilities, then λ_max wavelengths are sufficient to perform the channel assignment. Ring networks with fixed wavelength conversion capability within the nodes are proposed that can support all lightpath sets with load λ_max at most W-1, where W is the number of wavelengths in each link. Ring networks with a small additional amount of wavelength conversion capability within the nodes are also proposed that allow the support of any set of lightpaths with load λ_max at most W. A star network is also proposed with fixed wavelength conversion capability at its hub node that can support all lightpath sets with load λ_max at most W. These results are extended to tree networks and networks with arbitrary topologies. This provides evidence that significant improvements in traffic-carrying capacity can be obtained in WDM networks by providing very limited wavelength conversion capability within the network     

Light trees: optical multicasting for improved performance inwavelength routed networks

We introduce the concept of a light-tree in a wavelength-routed optical network. A light-tree is a point-to-multipoint generalization of a lightpath. A lightpath is a point-to-point all-optical wavelength channel connecting a transmitter at a source node to a receiver at a destination node. Lightpath communication can significantly reduce the number of hops (or lightpaths) a packet has to traverse; and this reduction can, in turn, significantly improve the network's throughput. We extend the lightpath concept by incorporating an optical multicasting capability at the routing nodes in order to increase the logical connectivity of the network and further decrease its hop distance. We refer to such a point-to-multipoint extension as a light-tree. Light-trees can not only provide improved performance for unicast traffic, but they naturally can better support multicast traffic and broadcast traffic. In this study, we shall concentrate on the application and advantages of light-trees to unicast and broadcast traffic. We formulate the light-tree-based virtual topology design problem as an optimization problem with one of two possible objective functions: for a given traffic matrix, (i) minimize the network-wide average packet hop distance, or (ii) minimize the total number of transceivers in the network. We demonstrate that an optimum light-tree-based virtual topology has clear advantages over an optimum lightpath-based virtual topology with respect to the above two objectives     

Constrained light-tree design for WDM mesh networks with multicast traffic grooming

Multicast applications such as IPTV, video conferencing, telemedicine and online multiplayer gaming are expected to be major drivers of Internet traffic growth. The disparity between the bandwidth offered by a wavelength and the bandwidth requirement of a multicast connection can be tackled by grooming multiple low bandwidth multicast connections into a high bandwidth wavelength channel or light-tree. Light-trees are known to be especially suited for networks that carry ample multicast traffic. In this paper, we propose new algorithms to address the problem of multicast traffic grooming. In particular, an Integer Linear Programming (ILP) formulation is proposed for optimal assignments of hop constrained light-trees for multicast connections so that network throughput can be maximized. Hop constrained light-trees improve the scalability of the approach by reducing the search space of the ILP formulation. Since solving the ILP problem is very time consuming for realistically large networks, we are motivated to propose a heuristic algorithm with a polynomial complexity, called Dividable Light-Tree Grooming (DLTG) algorithm. This algorithm is based on grooming traffic to constrained light-trees and also divides a light-tree to smaller constrained light-trees on which traffic is groomed for better resource utilization. Simulations show that the proposed DLTG heuristic performs better than other algorithms. It achieves network throughputs which are very close to the ILP formulation results, but with far lower running times.     

Efficient routing and wavelength assignment for multicast in WDMnetworks

The next generation multimedia applications such as video conferencing and HDTV have raised tremendous challenges on the network design, both in bandwidth and service. As wavelength-division-multiplexing (WDM) networks have emerged as a promising candidate for future networks with large bandwidth, supporting efficient multicast in WDM networks becomes eminent. Different from the IP layer, the cost of multicast at the WDM layer involves not only bandwidth (wavelength) cost, but also wavelength conversion cost and light splitting cost. It is well known that the optimal multicast problem in WDM networks is NP-hard. In this paper, we develop an efficient approximation algorithm consisting of two separate but integrated steps: multicast routing and wavelength assignment. We prove that the problem of optimal wavelength assignment on a multicast tree is not NP-hard; in fact, an optimal wavelength assignment algorithm with complexity of O(NW) is presented. Simulation results have revealed that the optimal wavelength assignment beats greedy algorithms by a large margin in networks using many wavelengths on each link such as dense wavelength-division-multiplexing (DWDM) networks. Our proposed heuristic multicast routing algorithm takes into account both the cost of using wavelength on links and the cost of wavelength conversion. The resulting multicast tree is derived from the optimal lightpaths used for unicast     

稀疏分光网络中的组播路由机制研究

仅部分节点具有组播能力的光网络称为稀疏分光网络,基于网络性能和成本的考虑,网络常为稀疏分光配置.稀疏分光网络中组播路由主要解决如何为多点传送的组播业务请求寻找合适的光树或光森林的问题.在综合分类的基础上,文章重点对目前稀疏分光网络中的组播路由机制和相关算法进行分析和总结,并对未来工作进行了展望.     

Virtual-node-based multicast routing and wavelength assignment in sparse-splitting optical networks

This paper investigates several problems associated with optical multicast routing and wavelength assignment in sparse-splitting optical networks for interactive real-time media distribution. Unfortunately, the constrained multicast routing with optimized wavelength assignment leads to NP-complete condition. Thus, in this paper, a virtual-node-based multicast routing algorithm is first proposed to satisfy the requirements of interactive real-time multicasting as well as the constraints from underlying optical networks. For the constructed multicast tree, we then associate an effective wavelength assignment algorithm. The experimental results show that the proposed algorithm combination performs well in terms of (1) the wavelength channel cost, (2) the maximum variation of inter-destination node delays, (3) the signal quality, and (4) the number of wavelength conversions.     

Multicasting on translucent multicast capable WDM mesh networks

As multicast applications becoming widely popular, supporting multicast in wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) networks is an important issue. Currently, there are two schemes to support multicast in WDM networks. One scheme is opaque multicasting which replicate bit stream in electronic domain. And the other is transparent multicasting which replicate bit stream all optically by a light splitter. However, both of two schemes have drawbacks or difficulties. This paper investigates an alternate translucent multicasting scheme, in which a fraction of branch nodes replicate bit stream at electronic domain and the other branch nodes replicate bit stream all optically. Replicating bit stream at electronic domain will introduce electronic processing overhead and extra delay. To satisfy the delay requirement of multicast session, the maximum number of electronic hops of a multicast tree must be less than an upper bound. In this paper, a hop-constrained multicast routing heuristic algorithm called shortest path based hop-constrained multicast routing (SPHMR) is proposed. A series of simulations are conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of translucent multicasting scheme. Simulation results show that the translucent multicasting scheme achieve a good compromise between network performance and network cost as well as power losses caused by light splitting.     

Multicast connection capacity of WDM switching networks with limited wavelength conversion

Currently, many bandwidth-intensive applications require multicast services for efficiency purposes. In particular, as wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) technique emerges as a promising solution to meet the rapidly growing demands on bandwidth in present communication networks, supporting multicast at the WDM layer becomes an important yet challenging issue. In this paper, we introduce a systematic approach to analyzing the multicast connection capacity of WDM switching networks with limited wavelength conversion. We focus on the practical all-optical limited wavelength conversion with a small conversion degree d (e.g., d=2 or 3), where an incoming wavelength can be switched to one of the d outgoing wavelengths. We then compare the multicast performance of the network with limited wavelength conversion to that of no wavelength conversion and full wavelength conversion. Our results demonstrate that limited wavelength conversion with small conversion degrees provides a considerable fraction of the performance improvement obtained by full wavelength conversion over no wavelength conversion. We also present an economical multistage switching architecture for limited wavelength conversion. Our results indicate that the multistage switching architecture along with limited wavelength conversion of small degrees is a cost-effective design for WDM multicast switching networks.     

Dynamic wavelength assignment for multicast in all-optical WDM networks to maximize the network capacity

We study the problem of wavelength assignment for multicast in order to maximize the network capacity in all-optical wavelength-division multiplexing networks. The motivation behind this work is to minimize the call blocking probability by maximizing the remaining network capacity after each wavelength assignment. While all previous studies on the same objective concentrate only on the unicast case, we study the problem for the multicast case. For a general multicast tree, we prove that the multicast wavelength assignment problem of maximizing the network capacity is NP-hard and propose two efficient greedy algorithms. We also study the same problem for a special network topology, a bidirectional ring network, which is practically the most important topology for optical networks. For bidirectional ring networks, a special multicast tree with at most two leaf nodes is constructed. Polynomial time algorithms for multicast wavelength assignment to maximize the network capacity exist under such a special multicast tree with regard to different splitting capabilities. Our work is the first effort to study the multicast wavelength assignment problem under the objective of maximizing network capacity.     

Online multicasting in WDM networks with shared light splitter bank

We study online multicasting in WDM networks with shared light splitter bank. Our objective is either to maximize the network throughput or to minimize the blocking probability. Due to the nature of dynamic requesting for network resources by online multicast requests, the network usually is unable to allocate the resources needed for each request in advance. Instead, it either accepts the request by building an economic multicast tree for the request, in terms of the utilization of the network resources if it has sufficient resources available, or rejects the request, otherwise. It is desirable that the cost of realizing each multicast request be minimized, and the network throughput will be maximized ultimately through the cost saving on each individual request. Since optical light splitting and wavelength conversion switching in optical networks is cost expensive and its fabrication is difficult, it is assumed that only a limited number of light splitters and wavelength converters are installed at a node, which will be shared by all the incoming signals at the node. In addition, it is further assumed that only a fraction of nodes in the network are installed with such optical switches. In this article we first propose a cost model for realizing an online multicast request under such network environments with limited light splitters and wavelength converters, which models the cost of utilization of network resources, particularly in modeling the light splitting and wavelength conversion ability at nodes. We then show that finding a cost-optimal multicast tree for a multicast request under the proposed cost model is NP-complete, and instead devise approximation and heuristic algorithms for it. We finally conduct experiments to evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithms. The results show that the proposed algorithms are efficient and effective in terms of network throughput.

Avoidance of multicast incapable branching nodes for multicast routing in WDM networks

In this article we study the multicast routing problem in all-optical WDM networks under the spare light splitting constraint. To implement a multicast session, several light-trees may have to be used due to the limited fanouts of network nodes. Although many multicast routing algorithms have been proposed in order to reduce the total number of wavelength channels used (total cost) for a multicast session, the maximum number of wavelengths required in one fiber link (link stress) and the end-to-end delay are two parameters which are not always taken into consideration. It is known that the shortest path tree (SPT) results in the optimal end-to-end delay, but it can not be employed directly for multicast routing in sparse light splitting WDM networks. Hence, we propose a novel wavelength routing algorithm which tries to avoid the multicast incapable branching nodes (MIBs, branching nodes without splitting capability) in the shortest-path-based multicast tree to diminish the link stress. Good parts of the shortest-path-tree are retained by the algorithm to reduce the end-to-end delay. The algorithm consists of tree steps: (1) a DijkstraPro algorithm with priority assignment and node adoption is introduced to produce a SPT with up to 38% fewer MIB nodes in the NSF topology and 46% fewer MIB nodes in the USA Longhaul topology, (2) critical articulation and deepest branch heuristics are used to process the MIB nodes, (3) a distance-based light-tree reconnection algorithm is proposed to create the multicast light-trees. Extensive simulations demonstrate the algorithm’s efficiency in terms of link stress and end-to-end delay.     

An Optical Wavelength-Routed Multicast Packet Switch Based on Multitimeslot Multiwavelength Conversion

This letter presents a new scheme to realize multicast operation in a wavelength-routed optical packet switch by adding multicast modules. The proposed multicasting scheme is based on multitimeslot multiwavelength conversion in conjunction with wavelength selection to resolve the problem of output contention.      

Survivable lightpath provisioning in WDM mesh networks under shared path protection and signal quality constraints

This paper addresses the problem of survivable lightpath provisioning in wavelength-division-multiplexing (WDM) mesh networks, taking into consideration optical-layer protection and some realistic optical signal quality constraints. The investigated networks use sparsely placed optical-electrical-optical (O/E/O) modules for regeneration and wavelength conversion. Given a fixed network topology with a number of sparsely placed O/E/O modules and a set of connection requests, a pair of link-disjoint lightpaths is established for each connection. Due to physical impairments and wavelength continuity, both the working and protection lightpaths need to be regenerated at some intermediate nodes to overcome signal quality degradation and wavelength contention. In the present paper, resource-efficient provisioning solutions are achieved with the objective of maximizing resource sharing. The authors propose a resource-sharing scheme that supports three kinds of resource-sharing scenarios, including a conventional wavelength-link sharing scenario, which shares wavelength links between protection lightpaths, and two new scenarios, which share O/E/O modules between protection lightpaths and between working and protection lightpaths. An integer linear programming (ILP)-based solution approach is used to find optimal solutions. The authors also propose a local optimization heuristic approach and a tabu search heuristic approach to solve this problem for real-world, large mesh networks. Numerical results show that our solution approaches work well under a variety of network settings and achieves a high level of resource-sharing rates (over 60% for O/E/O modules and over 30% for wavelength links), which translate into great savings in network costs.     

Virtual Source Based Multicast Routing in WDM Optical Networks

Wavelength-division multiplexed (WDM) networks using wavelength-routing are considered to be potential candidates for the next generation wide-area backbone networks. Multicasting is the ability to transmit information from a single source node to multiple destination nodes and is becoming an important requirement in high-speed networks. As WDM technology matures and multicast applications become increasingly popular, supporting multicast routing at the WDM layer becomes an important and yet a challenging topic. This paper concerns with the problem of optical multicast routing in WDM networks. A few nodes in the network may have wavelength conversion and/or splitting capabilities. In this paper, a new multicast tree construction algorithm is proposed. This algorithm is based on a concept called virtual source. A virtual source is a node having both the splitting and wavelength conversion capabilities. By exploiting the presence of virtual source nodes, the proposed algorithm achieves improved performance. To further improve the performance, the algorithm assigns priorities to nodes based on their capabilities. The effectiveness of the proposed algorithm is verified through extensive simulation experiments.     

组播技术及其在光层的实现

带宽密集型的多媒体应用对现有网络提出了新的要求,组播技术有助于解决其在网络带宽和服务质量方面的问题,而在光层实现组播具有更简单、高效的特点.然而,光层组播由于光缓存、光分束和光波长变换等光器件的限制,呈现出和IP层组播不同的特点.对IP层和光层组播进行了讨论,分析了光层组播模型,并对稀疏光分束和稀疏波长变换的光网络组播路由提出了重路由到源和重路由到相关节点两种重路由方式.     

Multicast protection scheme based on Hamiltonian cycle in fault-tolerant optical mesh networks

The increase of multimedia service requirements results in the growing popularity of the multicast in Wavelength-Division Multiplexing (WDM) optical mesh networks. Multicast fault tolerance in WDM optical mesh networks is an important issue because failures caused by the traffic carried in WDM optical mesh networks may lead to huge data loss. Previous works have proposed multicast protection algorithms to address the single-fiber link failure dominant in current optical mesh networks. However, these existing algorithms are all mainly based on path protection or segment protection, which may lead to long restoration times and complicated protection switching procedures. This paper therefore proposes a new heuristic algorithm, called Enhanced Multicast Hamiltonian Cycle Protection (EMHCP), in which all working light-trees of multicast demands can be protected by a Hamiltonian cycle in the network. For each multicast demand, EMHCP computes a least-cost light-tree based on the presented link-cost function that considers load balancing and proper straddling link selection so that backup wavelengths on the Hamiltonian cycle can be reduced. Simulation results show that EMHCP can obtain significant performance improvement compared with the conventional algorithm.