Route optimization of multicast sessions in sparse light-splitting optical networks

In this paper, we investigate the multicast routing problem in sparse splitting networks (MR-SSN). The MR-SSN problem is to find a route from the source node of a session to all destinations of the session such that the total number of fibers used in establishing the session is minimized while the multicast capable nodes are evenly distributed throughout the network. We present a heuristic based on Tabu search that requires only one transmitter for the source node and one wavelength for a multicast session in this paper. We test our heuristic on a wide range of network topologies and random sessions and conclude that the difference between our solution and ILP optimal solution in terms of the number of fibers used for establishing a multicast session is within 10% nearly all the time and within 5% in about half of the time.