From the perspectives of graph theory and combinatorics theory we obtain some new upper bounds on the number of encoding nodes, which can characterize the coding complexity of the network coding, both in feasible acyclic and cyclic multicast networks. In contrast to previous work, during our analysis we first investigate the simple multicast network with source rateh=2, and thenh≥2. We find that for feasible acyclic multicast networks our upper bound is exactly the lower bound given by M. Langberg et al. in 2006. So the gap between their lower and upper bounds for feasible acyclic multicast networks does not exist. Based on the new upper bound, we improve the computational complexity given by M. Langberg et al. in 2009. Moreover, these results further support the feasibility of signatures for network coding.
Network monitoring in multicast networks using network coding
