Blocking performance of a three-stage multicasting network

The problem of blocking performance evaluation in an interconnection network loaded either by multicast traffic or mixed unicast-multicast traffic is addressed. In particular, a three-stage network is considered that is initially equipped to satisfy the nonblocking conditions for unicast traffic. Different network configurations are considered in which either the number of second-stage matrices is increased for a square network or the number of inlets to the network is decreased so as to obtain a rectangular expansion network. The study, based on computer simulation, highlights the network blocking issues raised by multicast traffic