QoS-driven multicast routing in sparse-splitting optical networks

This paper investigates the quality-of-service (QoS)-driven multicast routing problem in a sparse-splitting optical network. The main objective is to minimize the total cost of wavelength channels utilized by the light-tree while satisfying required QoS parameters. In this paper, both the optical-layer constraints (e.g., optical signal power) and application-layer requirements (e.g., end-to-end delay and inter-destination delay variation) are considered as the QoS parameters. First, integer linear programming (ILP) formulations to solve the optimal multicast routing problem with the given QoS parameters are presented. Solving the ILP formulations for large-scale networks can easily overwhelm the capabilities of state-of-the-art computing facilities, and hence, a heuristic algorithm is proposed to construct a feasible light-tree that satisfies the required QoS parameters in large-scale networks. Simulation results demonstrate the performance of the proposed heuristic algorithm in terms of the cost of utilized wavelength channels.