An Optimized Timer-based method for Feedback Control in Multicast Communication

We formulate a general method for finding the most optimal ti mer distribution function for stochastic feedback control in multicast systems by minimizing a user-defined cost functional, which incorporates both feedback implosion avoidance and latency constraints. We propose a novel shifted power-law timer and show through numerical analysis and simulations that it outperforms the previously proposed exponential timer (J. Nonnemacher and E.W. Biersack, IEE/ACM Trans. Networking, vol 7, pp 375-386, June 1999) function. We illustrate how our method can be used to design optimized timers for feedback control in system with specific latency constraints.