Probability distribution of the receiver busy time in a multicasting local lightwave network

Wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) has the ability to utilize the enormous bandwidth offered by optical networks using todayʹs electronics. A reservation-based multicasting protocol for local lightwave networks was examined in Borella and Mukherjee, 1995. If implemented properly, multicasting allows the use of scarce network resources more efficiently than unicasting. On the other hand, a multicasting protocol is usually more complex than a unicasting protocol. An analytical model of a multicasting protocol can enable its comparison with a simpler but less efficient unicasting protocol. We present an approximate analytical solution for the average packet delay in a local lightwave network, which employs the Multicast Scheduling Algorithm (Borella and Mukherjee, 1995) as its medium-access control (MAC) protocol. First, we develop an approximate analytical solution for the probability distribution of the receiver busy time. We demonstrate and explain some interesting and unobvious behavior of this distribution. Then, using the receiver busy time distribution, we calculate the maximum receiver throughput and the average packet delay. Results from the analytical solution match very well with those obtained from simulation.