An autonomous and decentralized protocol for delay sensitive overlay multicast tree

Here, we present a protocol for dynamically maintaining a degree-bounded delay sensitive spanning tree in a decentralized way on overlay networks. The protocol aims at repairing the spanning tree autonomously even if multiple node's leave operations or failures (disappearances) occur simultaneously or continuously in a specified period. It also aims at maintaining the diameter (maximum delay) of the tree as small as possible. The simulation results using ns-2 have shown that the protocol could keep reasonable diameters compared with the existing centralized static algorithm even if many node's participations and disappearances occur frequently.