p-Cycle-based node failure protection for survivable virtual network embedding

Network Virtualization offers to Physical Infrastructure Provider (PIP) the possibility to smoothly roll out multiple isolated networks on top of his infrastructure. A major challenge in this respect is the embedding problem which deals with the mapping of Virtual Networks (VNs) resources on PIP network. In literature, a number of research proposals have been focused on providing heuristic approaches to solve this NP-hard problem while most often assuming that PIP infrastructure is operational at all time. In virtualization environment a single physical node failure can result in single/multi logical link failure(s) as it effects all VNs with a mapping that spans over. Setup a dedicated backup for each VN embedding, i.e., no sharing, is inefficient in terms of resource usage. To address these concerns, we propose in this work an approach for VN mapping with combined physical node and multiple logical links protection mechanism (VNM-CNLP) that: (a) uses a large scale optimization technique, developed in our previous work, to calculate in a first stage a cost-efficient VN mapping while minimizing the effects of a single node failure in VN layer, and (b) proposes in a second stage link p-Cycle based protection techniques that minimize the backup resources while providing a full VN protection scheme against a single physical node failure and a multiple logical links failure. Our simulations show a clear advantage of VNM-CNLP approach over benchmark in terms of VN backup cost and resources utilization.