Deterministic multi-channel information exchange

Stephan Holzer, Thomas Locher, Yvonne-Anne Pignolet, Roger Wattenhofer

Abstract: In this paper, we study the information exchange problem on a set of multiple access channels: k arbitrary nodes have information they want to distribute to the entire network via a shared medium partitioned into channels. We present algorithms and lower bounds on the time and channel complexity for disseminating these k information items in a single-hop network of n nodes. More precisely, we devise a deterministic algorithm running in asymptotically optimal time O(k) using O(n(log (k)/k)) channels if k less or equal to (1/6) * log n and O(log(1+p) (n/k) channels otherwise, where p>0 is an arbitrarily small constant. In addition, we show that Omega(n(Ω(1/k))+logk n) channels are necessary to achieve this time complexity.