Estimating time complexity of rumor spreading in ad-hoc networks

Abstract

Rumor spreading is a fundamental communication process: given a network topology modeled by a graph and a source node with a message, the goal is to disseminate the source message to all network nodes. In this work we give a new graph-based formula that is a relatively tight estimate of the time complexity of rumor spreading in ad-hoc networks by popular Push&Pull protocol. We demonstrate its accuracy by comparing it to previously considered characteristics, such as graph conductance or vertex expansion, which in some cases are even exponentially worse than our new characterization. © 2013 Springer-Verlag.