On the departure process of a leaky bucket system with long-range dependent input traffic

Due to the strong experimental evidence that the traffic to be offered to future broadband networks will display long-range dependence, it is important to study the possible implications that such traffic may have for the design and performance of these networks. In particular, an important question is whether the offered traffic preserves its long-range dependent nature after passing through a policing mechanism at the interface of the network. One of the proposed solutions for flow control in the context of the emerging ATM standard is the so-called leaky bucket scheme. In this paper we consider a leaky bucket system with long-range dependent input traffic. We adopt the following popular model for long-range dependent traffic: Time is discrete. At each unit time a random number of sessions is initiated, having the distribution of a Poisson random variable with mean λ. Each of these sessions has a random duration τ, where the integer random variable τ has finite mean, infinite variance, and a regularly varying tail, i.e., P(τ >К) ~ К^-Lα L(К), where 1 < α < 2 L(·) is a slowly varying function. Once a session is initiated, it generates one cell at each unit of time until its termination. We examine the departure process of the leaky bucket policing mechanism driven by such an arrival process, and show that it too is long-range dependent for any token buffer size and any - finite or infinite - cell buffer size. Moreover, upper and lower bounds for the covariance sequence of the output process are established. The above results demonstrate that long-range dependence cannot be removed by the kinds of flow control schemes that are currently being envisioned for broadband networks. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

The asymptotic behavior of queueing systems: Large deviations theory and dominant pole approximation

This paper presents the exact asymptotics of the steady state behavior of a broad class of single-node queueing systems. First we show that the asymptotic probability functions derived using large deviations theory are consistent (in a certain sense) with the result using dominant pole approximations. Then we present an exact asymptotic formula for the cumulative probability function of the queue occupancy and relate it to the cell loss ratio, an important performance measure for service systems such as ATM networks. The analysis relies on a new generalization of the Taylor coefficients of a complex function which we call characteristic coefficients. Finally we apply our framework to obtain new results for the M/D/1 system and for a more intricate multiclass M/D/n system.     

MORPHOLOGY OF POLYURETHANES REVISITED BY COMPLEMENTARY AFM AND TEM

Cast, segmented polyetherurethanes with 30 and 50% hard-segment content (HSC), respectively, were studied by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). Multi-phase segregation was observed in both samples on two levels (micro and nano) of structural organization. Spherulites with a prominent radial structure, built of branched fibrils and globules, were captured on the micrometer level. The use of AFM enabled us to investigate the nanostructure in the polyurethanes studied here. In the sample with low (30%) HSC, nano-scale phase separation was observed by AFM in areas outside the crystalline aggregates. The morphology in these domains exhibited short, rodlike hard domains embedded in the matrix of the soft segments. The other sample (50% HSC) contained four identifiable morphological features. These included spherulites, globules, bundles of lamellae, and nanophase-separated, rodlike hard domains, embedded in the soft-segment matrix.

The globules did not have any internal structure visible by AFM down to the nanometer scale. We speculate that the globules form as a result of macro-phase segregation, due to incompatibility of the reactants, during synthesis and may thus be identified as pockets of free hard segments. The AFM phase imaging has been very useful to observe the bundles of lamellae and the nanoscale phase-separated structures, which were not captured by TEM, due to large differences in AFM phase signal contrast between the hard and the soft domains.     

The Markov modulated regulated Brownian motion: A second-order fluid flow model of a finite buffer

A second-order fluid flow model of a queue with finite capacity buffer and variable net input process is presented, based on the previous work of Karandikar and Kulkarni (1995). Queue length is modelled as a Brownian motion whose parameters are controlled by a finite state Markov chain. The process, termed a Markov modulated regulated Brownian motion (MMRBM), provides analytical solutions for steady state queue length distributions, overflow losses and idleness probabilities using boundary regulators. Applications of the model include queues with failure-prone servers and ATM statistical multiplexers with variable traffic loads. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Layouts for mobility management in wireless ATM networks

In this paper, we present a new model that combines quality of service and mobility aspects in wireless ATM networks. Namely, besides the hop count and load parameters of the basic ATM layouts, we introduce a new notion of distance that estimates the time needed to reconstruct the virtual channel of a wireless user when he moves through the network. Quality of service guarantee dictates that the rerouting phase must be imperceptible, that is, the maximum distance between two virtual channels must be maintained as low as possible. Therefore, a natural combinatorial problem arises in which suitable trade-offs must be determined between the different performance measures. We first show that establishing the existence of a layout with maximum hop count h, load l and distance d is NP-complete, even in the very restricted case h=2, l=1 and d=1. We then provide optimal layout constructions for basic interconnection networks, such as chains and rings.     

ATMOS (ATM optical switching)—system perspective

The expected traffic growth from new broadband services will require network capacities that can be beneficially provided by optical WDM transport networks. Optical packet techniques are essential for large networks to provide flexibility and granularity. A layered network architecture with a transparent optical layer and optical packet layers has been elaborated. Four switching concept options for large optical ATM switch fabrics in the public network and small access nodes are presented. The technology for the related key functions of space and wavelength switching was developed in the RACE ATMOS project and the feasibility of concepts and technologies was verified in four system demonstrators.     

Stability and performance analysis of rate-based feedback flow controlled ATM networks

Motivated by ABR class of service in ATM networks, we study a continuous time queueing system with a feedback control of the arrival rate of some of the sources. The feedback about the queue length or the total workload is provided at regular intervals (variations on it, especially the traffic management specification TM 4.0, are also considered). The propagation delays can be nonnegligible. For a general class of feedback algorithms, we obtain the stability of the system in the presence of one or more bottleneck nodes in the virtual circuit. Our system is general enough that it can be useful to study feedback control in other network protocols. We also obtain rates of convergence to the stationary distributions and finiteness of moments. For the single botterneck case, we provide algorithms to compute the stationary distributions and the moments of the sojourn times in different sets of states. We also show analytically (by showing continuity of stationary distributions and moments) that for small propagation delays, we can provide feedback algorithms which have higher mean throughput, lower probability of overflow and lower delay jitter than any open loop policy. Finally these results are supplemented by some computational results. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

一种用于波分复用系统的ATM光交换模型

波分复用是增大通信容量,提高线路利用率的常用技术.本文提出了一种用于波分复用系统的ATM光交换模型.该结构利用波分复用的特点,采用内部多通道互连方式,使其具有易于实现、结构简单、对内部缓存要求较低等优点.并对该模型进行了性能分析,得出了结论.     

Controlled and optimally controlled multiplexing systems: A numerical exploration

Large controlled multiplexing systems are approximated by diffusion type processes yielding a very efficient way of approximation and good numerical methods. The limit equations are an efficient aggregation of the original system, and provide the basis of the actual numerical approximation to the control problem. The numerical approximations have the structure of the original problem, but are generally much simpler. The control can occur in a variety of places; e.g., leaky bucket controllers, control of marked cells at the transmitter buffer, or control of the transmitter speed. From the point of view of the limit equations, those are equivalent. Various forms of the optimal control problem are explored, where the main aim is to control or balance the losses at the control with those due to buffer overflow. It is shown that much can be saved via the use of optimal controls or reasonable approximations to them. We discuss systems with one to three classes of sources, various aggregation methods and control approximation schemes. There are qualitative comparisons of various systems with and without control and a discussion of the variations of control and performance as the systems data and control bounds vary. The approach is a very useful tool for providing both qualitative and quantitative information which would be hard to get otherwise. The results have applications to various forms of the ATM and broadband integrated data networks.The work was partially supported by AFOSR-91-0375 and (AFOSR) F49620-92-J-088-1DEF.The work was partially supported by grants (AFOSR) F49620-92-J-008-1DEF, AFOSR-91-03750.This work was partially supported by DAAH04-93-0070 (ARO) and AFOSR-91-0375.     

Overflow and loss probabilities in a finite ATM buffer fed by self-similar traffic

In [13], real-time measurements from LANs, variable-bit-rate video sources, ISDN control-channels, the World Wide Web and other communication systems have shown that traffic exhibits a behaviour of self-similar nature. In this paper, we give new lower bounds to buffer-overflow and cell-loss probabilities for an ATM queue system with a self-similar cell input traffic and finite buffer. The bounds are better than those obtained in [20], in an important region of parameters. As in [20], they decay hyperbolically with buffer size, when the latter goes to infinity. However, in some region, a factor which accompanies the decay is higher in this paper than in [20]. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.