Congestion control in interconnected - Interdependent network: Ant system model

Managing congestion has become a major concern for network designers and engineers. The problem continues to worsen with the growth of high bandwidth applications. This paper builds a model for managing congestion. Dorigo's (1996) Ant System Model is used as a starting point in developing an adaptive system for managing congested interconnected-interdependent networks. The analogy is made between nodes on the interconnected-interdependent system and towns in the traveling salesman problem - addressed by Dorigo's Ant System Model. Congestion is modeled into Dorigo's existing framework, establishing optimal paths for packets in a packet switched network, and alternate paths as the optimal paths become congested. The Ant System Model provides an adaptive system for addressing congestion control problems, allowing for rapid discovery of a good solution without incorporating a significant risk of premature convergence.