Development and performance of cellular automaton model of OSI network layer of packet-switching networks

We present a cellular automaton model of the OSI network layer. Our focus is on parameters that can affect flow and congestion in the network, such as randomly inserted additional links, used to model additional wired and wireless connections in LANs and WANs. We present selected simulation results and observe, in accordance with other models, that throughput is maximal at the critical load of the network. Further, the addition of links increases the critical load of a network if queueing costs are taken into account in routing decisions for packets.