Multicast Communication in Staircase Multichannel Networks

This paper addresses multicast communication in a family of multichannel networks with staircase topologies. Although the topologies are single-hop, in that every node can reach every other node in a single hop, several channels may be required in order to reach multiple destinations. The topologies are analyzed with respect to their ability to support multicast communication, and algorithms are proposed that determine the set of channels on which to send a multicast message in order to reach a particular set of destinations. The algorithms are provably optimal for the majority of topologies under consideration.