Many-server diffusion limits for G/Ph/n+GI queues

This paper studies many-server limits for multi-server queues that have a phase-type service time distribution and allow for customer abandonment. The first set of limit theorems is for critically loaded G/Ph/n + GI queues, where the patience times are independent, identically distributed following a general distribution. The next limit theorem is for overloaded G/Ph/n + M queues, where the patience time distribution is restricted to be exponential. We prove that a pair of diffusion-scaled total-customer-count and server-allocation processes, properly centered, converges in distribution to a continuous Markov process as the number of servers n goes to infinity. In the overloaded case, the limit is a multi-dimensional diffusion process, and in the critically loaded case, the limit is a simple transformation of a diffusion process. When the queues are critically loaded, our diffusion limit generalizes the result by Puhalskii and Reiman (2000) for GI/Ph/n queues without customer abandonment. When the queues are overloaded, the diffusion limit provides a refinement to a fluid limit and it generalizes a result by Whitt (2004) for M/M/n / + M queues with an exponential service time distribution. The proof techniques employed in this paper are innovative. First, a perturbed system is shown to be equivalent to the original system. Next, two maps are employed in both fluid and diffusion scalings. These maps allow one t