Network congestion can be controlled: Routing algorithms in optical networks and Ethernets

Congestion and contention can greatly reduce the effective performance of an interconnection network. This report gathers together research done under a Laboratory Research and Development Program (LDRD) project at Sandia National Laboratories. The goal of the project was to explore the contention properties of novel optical interconnects. In the process of exploring optical interconnects the project also gained new insights into the use of backoff protocols in the current dominant interconnect technology, Ethernet