Deterministic Network Model Revisited: An Algebraic Network Coding Approach

The capacity of multiuser networks has been a longstanding problem in information theory. Recently, Avestimehr et al. have proposed a deterministic network model to approximate multiuser wireless networks. This model, known as the ADT network model, takes into account the broadcast nature of wireless medium and interference. The authors show that the ADT network model can be described within the algebraic network coding framework introduced by the authors. They prove that the ADT network problem can be captured by a single matrix, and show that the min-cut of an ADT network is the rank of this matrix; thus, eliminating the need to optimize over exponential number of cuts between two nodes to compute the min-cut of an ADT network.