Multicluster interleaving on paths and cycles

Interleaving codewords is an important method not only for combatting burst errors, but also for distributed data retrieval. This paper introduces the concept of multicluster interleaving (MCI), a generalization of traditional interleaving problems. MCI problems for paths and cycles are studied. The following problem is solved: how to interleave integers on a path or cycle such that any m (m≥2) nonoverlapping clusters of order 2 in the path or cycle have at least three distinct integers. We then present a scheme using a "hierarchical-chain structure" to solve the following more general problem for paths: how to interleave integers on a path such that any m (m≥2) nonoverlapping clusters of order L (L≥2) in the path have at least L+1 distinct integers. It is shown that the scheme solves the second interleaving problem for paths that are asymptotically as long as the longest path on which an MCI exists, and clearly, for shorter paths as well.