Removing instability and maximizing throughput in a multicast shuffle-exchange network

Multicast capability can be incorporated into any interconnection network by using a general packet replication scheme. The network can then be used for both packet replication and routing processes. Unfortunately, such a multicast network can easily evolve to saturation due to instability. Once the network is saturated, the throughput drops to zero. The operation of the multicast network must therefore be carefully controlled to avoid the unstable region. Not well-thought-out control schemes, however, may result in a small throughput and inefficient utilization of the network. This paper investigates the stability issue in the multicast shuffle-exchange network in detail. Several schemes are then proposed to remove network instability. Our study indicates that a dynamic access control scheme can potentially achieve high network throughput even under nonuniform traffic conditions