Towards a queueing-based framework for in-network function computation
Queueing Systems: Theory and Applications
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Recently, the network utilization maximization theory has been extended to include resource allocation for multi-hop wireless networks. However, the existing theory is applicable only to unicast flows. Other than developing appropriate notations, it is somewhat straightforward to extend the theory to multicast flows if one assumes that data is delivered to all the receivers in a multicast group at the same rate. Such a form of multicast is called single-rate multicast. On the other hand, there are many video applications which allow layered-transmission so that different receivers can subscribe to different numbers of layers and receive different qualities of the same video, depending upon the congestion level in their respective neighborhoods. Moreover, in wireless networks, due to varying signal strengths at different receivers, it may not be desirable nor feasible to deliver data at the same rate to all the receivers in a multicast group. Thus, it is important to extend the optimization-based theory to handle multi-rate multicast flows, i.e., multicast flows where different receivers are allowed to receive at different rates. Such an extension is not straightforward as in the case of single-rate multicast, and is the main subject of this paper. We note that the multi-rate multicast problem has been considered in the context of wired network. However, those approaches cannot be directly applied to wireless networks.