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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Comms. Net., 02 November 2022
Sec. Wireless Communications

On the age of information for non-preemptive queues in tandem

Clement Kam
Clement Kam*Sastry KompellaSastry Kompella
  • U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC, United States

A monitoring system operates over a network of first-come, first-served queues in tandem, in which a source is transmitting its status to a monitor at the end of the tandem. To characterize the freshness performance of this monitoring system, we analyze the average Age of Information for this system, in which the status update arrivals are Poisson distributed and each queue is served by a non-preemptive, memoryless server. We first study the case of single-capacity queues that are modeled as a stochastic hybrid system, and we derive the average age for two queues with different service rates and three queues with equal service rate. We then study the infinite capacity queue case and use the graphical approach to derive the average age for two queues in tandem with equal service rates. Finally, we simulate the average age for intermediate cases of k capacity queues, which fall in between the two extreme cases of k = 1 and k = .

1 Introduction

In applications for the Internet of Things (IoT) or military applications, it is often important for a device or entity at one point in the network to have information (e.g., sensor data) from another point in the network that is as fresh as possible. The concept of Age of Information (AoI) applies to communication systems where the receiver has an interest in fresh (i.e., most recently generated) information. However, traditional metrics such as packet delay are insufficient for characterizing the performance of systems that rely on real-time monitoring applications. AoI is a widely-explored metric to measure the performance of real-time status updating applications, such as position tracking, environmental/health monitoring, or networked control systems (Kaul et al., 2011; 2012a). In most works studying AoI, the goal is to derive the age averaged over time for various single queue models (Kaul et al., 2012b; Yates and Kaul, 2012; Kam et al., 2013). However, in IoT systems or ad hoc military networks, real-time information is often needed over multiple hops, which can include wireless and wired links. In this work, we focus on analyzing the average AoI for queues in tandem to obtain insight into the performance of real-time status updating systems that operate over a multi-hop network.

Research on AoI has focused on understanding the performance of systems that are modeled by different types of queues, with various arrival/departure processes, number of servers, and queue capacities (Kam et al., 2016a; Bedewy et al., 2016; Costa et al., 2016; Kosta et al., 2017; Sun et al., 2017). While most studies have focused on analyzing single queues, tandem queues have recently been recognized as an important area of study for understanding the AoI for networks beyond a single hop. Chiariotti et al. (2020) studied a system of two connected satellite links for another age-related metric, called the Peak AoI (PAoI), by modeling the system as a series of M/M/1 queues. In contrast to the average AoI studied in this work, PAoI tracks the maximum instantaneous value of AoI for each update. Similarly, tandem satellite links were also studied by Soret et al. (2020), who derived a bound on the average AoI for satellites modeled as queues that received updates directly from ground stations and relayed updates from previous satellites in the tandem. Vikhrova et al. (2020) studied tandem queues with updates that are randomly sent to one of two queues and priority is given to the second queue. In Xu et al. (2020), the average PAoI was analyzed for an IoT network (multiple sources) feeding into tandem queues. In Kuang et al. (2019), a mobile edge computing system was modeled as a tandem queue and the average AoI was analyzed for a zero-wait message generation policy.

There has also been some earlier work on AoI in more general multi-hop networks. For example, wireless scheduling for AoI was studied in Talak et al. (2017), who derived the average and peak average AoI-optimal stationary scheduling policies for line networks, where links are activated according to a stationary probability distribution. However, the authors did not derive the average and peak average AoI in closed form. Bedewy et al. (2017) studied the preemptive Last Generated First Served (LGFS) policy, and show that this policy results in a smaller age at all nodes in the network than any other causal policy. The caveats are that the packets are generated at an external source and are dispersed throughout the network via a gateway node, packet transmission times over a network are exponentially distributed, and the age optimization is done in a stochastic ordering sense.

The work that most closely relates to this article is that of Yates (2018); Yates (2020), which studies a line network of preemptive servers. These works analyzed the AoI for this system using a stochastic hybrid system (SHS) modeling approach, as in Yates and Kaul (2019). It was shown in Yates (2020) that for this line network, the age at the destination (or any node in between) is identical in distribution to the sum of independent exponential service times up to the node. Although preemption has been shown to be optimal for exponential servers (Bedewy et al., 2017), the same is not true for general service time distributions. In addition, many practical communication systems do not allow for this type of control for packets in transmission. Furthermore, in most works on queues in tandem, closed form expressions are often given as bounds or for the more tractable PAoI metric. Therefore, it is still important to characterize the average AoI of non-preemptive servers in closed form, which is the focus of this article. The analysis here is more challenging than that in the preemption case because it does not allow for the reduction of states in the SHS model, which greatly simplifies the analysis.

More recently, the SHS approach has been extended to not only derive the average AoI but to actually derive the complete distribution of the AoI. The SHS approach for deriving the moment generating function (MGF) for the AoI was first presented in Yates (2020), where it was also applied to a line network of preemptive queues. However, few works have since applied that approach to different systems, such as an energy-harvesting node with varying types of preemptive and non-preemptive policies by Abd-Elmagid and Dhillon (2022a); Abd-Elmagid and Dhillon (2022b), and a two-source single-server system with packet management by Moltafet et al. (2021). In this work, we have derived the first moment (average) of the AoI for non-preemptive queues in tandem. However, deriving the MGF is a more complex derivation that is being considered for a follow-up work.

Koukoutsidis (2020) developed an approach to calculate the average AoI for an overtake-free network of quasi-reversible queues, including M/M/1/ queues in tandem (which we also consider), as well as networks with different classes of update packets. In contrast to the SHS approach, they used the queueing theoretical result that the end-to-end sojourn time for an overtake-free path is distributed as a sum of independent exponential sojourns at each node. However, in their AoI calculation, they make the assumption that, because the interarrival and interdeparture times are identically distributed, their correlation with the sojourn time is equal1. This is not true in general and thus they derive a different result for the M/M/1/ queues in tandem2.

In this work, we start by deriving the average age for two non-preemptive queues in tandem, in which each of the queues have a capacity equal to 1. This is done using the SHS approach. Limiting the queue capacity is based on the intuition that allowing updates to age in a queue may not be efficient when the objective is to maximize information freshness at the destination because the queues will not store obsolete packets unnecessarily. This has the additional advantage of making the analysis of the average age more tractable. Furthermore, this should approximate the performance of a non-preemptive LGFS and is likely to outperform it. To verify our theoretical result, we simulate the single-capacity non-preemptive queues in tandem. We extend the analysis by considering three non-preemptive queues in tandem. We then compare our result with an approximation for arbitrary number of non-preemptive single-capacity queues in tandem.

Next, we consider the case of infinite capacity queues in tandem, with a Poisson arrival process and exponential servers. Unfortunately, applying the SHS approach in this case makes the problem intractable because this results in an explosion of states in the SHS model. Therefore, we resort to the traditional method of deriving the average age using a graphical argument, whereby we evaluate the correlations between system times and interarrival or interdeparture times. Again, to verify the theoretical result, we simulate the infinite capacity non-preemptive queues in tandem. Finally, to develop a holistic understanding of this problem space, we study the case of capacity-k non-preemptive queues in tandem. We generate simulation results for capacity-k queues in tandem because we lack theoretical expressions of average age for arbitrary values of k.

The remainder of this article is organized as follows. The system model is described in Section 2. The average age for capacity-1 queues in tandem is derived in Section 3 using the SHS approach. The average age for infinite capacity queues in tandem is derived in Section 4 using the traditional graphical approach. Various simulation results, including those for capacity-k queues, are provided in Section 5. Finally, we summarize our results in Section 6.

2 System model

We study the AoI over a network of queues in tandem, as shown in Figure 1. A source generates arrivals as a rate λ Poisson process and then sends them to the first queue. The packets flow through a series of queues serving packets at rate μi until they reach the monitor (as depicted in the figure). There is no preemption in this system, such that a packet in service completes service before the server becomes available for another packet and a packet that arrives to a full queue is dropped. Aside from this queue overflow, there are no other packet losses under this model.

FIGURE 1
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FIGURE 1. Queues in tandem.

The AoI at the monitor at time t is defined as Δ(t) = tu(t), where u(t) is the time at which the freshest packet at the monitor was generated at the source. A sample path of the age for a single-capacity queue is given in Figure 2, where ti and τi are the time of generation and time of arrival at the monitor of the ith update, respectively. In this figure, packet 2 is dropped due to the server being occupied. We are interested in deriving the average AoI,

Δ=limT1T0TΔtdt.(1)

FIGURE 2
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FIGURE 2. Age of information vs. time, single-capacity queue: ti and τi are the time of generation and time of arrival at the monitor of the ith update, respectively.

3 Average age of single-capacity queues in tandem

3.1 Two ⋅/M/1/1 queues in tandem

For our theoretical analysis, we start by looking at two queues with a capacity of one, such that any packet that arrives to a queue with a packet already in service is dropped. We focus on a Poisson arrival process from the source into the first queue and the packets are served at each queue with an exponential service time. The traditional method of deriving the average AoI involves a graphical argument and the need to evaluate correlations between system times and interarrival or interdeparture times (Kaul et al. 2012a). With queues in tandem, this approach is non-trivial—not only in calculating the correlations between the waiting times and the interarrival times but it also requires the correlation between waiting times at the different queues to be calculated, among other correlations. In a capacity-limited system, we would also need to account for packet losses at both queues. In this section, we use the notation ⋅/M/1/1, where the initial “⋅” indicates that there are no exogenous arrivals to the queues further down the tandem.

An alternative method of calculating the average age was recently proposed that models the system as a SHS (Yates and Kaul, 2019), which avoids the complexity of computing the correlation quantities in the graphical approach. The SHS is modeled with a hybrid state (q(t), x(t)), where q(t)Q is the discrete Markov state of the queueing system and x(t)Rn is the continuous state that captures the evolution of the ages at different points in the system. Following the approach in Yates (2018), we model the two ⋅/M/1/1 queues in tandem (as described in Section 2), with the discrete state set Q={00,10,01,11}, where q1q2Q, qi = 1 indicates that queue i has a packet in service, and qi = 0 when the queue is empty3. The continuous state for this system is x(t) = [x1(t), x2(t), x3(t)], where x3(t) is the age at the monitor and xi(t) is the age of the packet being served at queue i when there is a packet in service, and otherwise xi(t) is irrelevant and set to 0.

For the Markov chain q(t), the transitions between states lL are directed edges (ql,ql) with transition rate λlδql,q(t), where the Kronecker delta ensures that the transition l only occurs in state ql. In SHS, these transitions correspond to changes in the discrete state q(t), as well as jumps in the continuous state x(t), according to x′ = xAl, where Al is a binary matrix that defines the jumps in x(t) for the discrete state transition l. These transitions may be self-transitions, in which the discrete state stays the same but the continuous state jumps. In addition, there may be multiple transitions between the same pair of states depending on the different impact on the continuous state, which is unlike typical continuous-time Markov chains. In this work, there are no self-transitions or multiple transitions that need to be modeled.

For all q̂Q, we define πq̂(t) to be the discrete Markov state probabilities. We define vq̂j(t) as the correlation between the continuous age state x(t) and the occupancy of the discrete state at time t; that is, q(t). These definitions are given as follows:

πq̂t=Eδq̂,qt(2)
vq̂jt=Exjtδq̂,qt,j1,,n.(3)

From this, we also have the vector functions

vq̂t=vq̂1t,,vq̂nt=Extδq̂,qt,(4)

where n is the number of dimensions in the continuous state x(t). For an ergodic queueing system, the average age is given by Δ=E[xn]=q̄Qv̄q̄n, where v̄q̄j=limtv̄q̄j(t) is the steady-state correlation between the discrete and age states. To derive the steady state vq̄(t), we need the following first order differential equation for all q̄Q as derived in Yates and Kaul (2019):

v̇q̄t=1π̄q̄+lLq̄λlvqltAlvq̄tlLq̄λl(5)

where Lq̄ is the set of transitions entering q̄ and Lq̄ is the set of transitions leaving q̄. The rate at which the continuous state changes is the 1 vector because the age increases linearly with a slope of 1. To solve for the steady state vq̄(t), we let v̇q̄(t)=0, yielding

v̄q̄lLq̄λl=1π̄q̄+lLq̄λlv̄qlAl,q̄Q.(6)

According to Yates and Kaul (2019, Theorem 4), if we can find a non-negative solution v̄=[v̄00v̄11] to (6), then the then differential Eq. 5 is stable and the average age is given by Δ=q̄Qv̄q̄3.

For the two single-capacity queue system in this section, the discrete Markov chain is given in Figure 3, where the states are qQ and the transition labels are lL, which correspond to qlql. Following Yates and Kaul (2019), we list the transitions, the transition rates, and the quantities in (6) associated with the mapping of jumps in the continuous state at transitions Al in Table 1.

FIGURE 3
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FIGURE 3. SHS Markov chain for two ⋅/M/1/1 queues in tandem.

TABLE 1
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TABLE 1. Table of transitions for the Markov chain in Figure 3.

Two examples of how we determined the table entries follow. Transition l = 1 corresponds to a packet arrival to a completely empty system, which occurs at rate λ, and the jump in the continuous state (xAl) is such that the age at the monitor remains the same (x3), the packet in service at queue 1 starts at 0, and the age at the empty server does not matter, so it is set to 0. A transition that is specific to non-preemptive queues in tandem is l = 6, which corresponds to the packet in the first server completing service (at a rate of μ1) in a full system, such that it gets dropped at the second queue. For xAl, the age at the monitor remains the same (x3), the age at the second queue remains the same because there is no preemption (x2), and the age at the first monitor goes to zero because it was served and dropped at the second queue.

We use the balance equations to derive the discrete Markov state stationary probabilities π̄q̄:

π̄q̄lLq̄λl=lLq̄λlπ̄ql,q̄Qq̄Qπ̄q̄=1.

Filling these equations with the quantities from Table 1 and by solving for the stationary probabilities, we obtain.

π̄00=μ1μ2λ+μ1λ+μ2(7a)
π̄01=λμ1λ+μ1λ+μ2(7b)
π̄10=λμ2λ+μ1+μ2λ+μ1λ+μ2μ1+μ2(7c)
π̄11=λ2μ1λ+μ1λ+μ2μ1+μ2.(7d)

We can substitute these stationary probabilities and the quantities in Table 1 into (6) to obtain the following system of equations:

λv̄003=π00+μ2v̄012(8a)
λ+μ2v̄013=π01+μ1v̄103+v̄113(8b)
μ1v̄103=π10+λv̄003+μ2v̄112(8c)
μ1+μ2v̄113=π11+λv̄013(8d)
λ+μ2v̄012=π01+μ1v̄101+v̄112(8e)
μ1+μ2v̄112=π11+λv̄012(8f)
μ1v̄101=π10+μ2v̄111(8g)
μ1+μ2v̄111=π01(8h)

To derive the average age, it is not necessary to solve for all of the v̄q̄j but only q̄Qv̄q̄3. We start by finding the linear combination of Eqs 8a8d using coefficients a, b, c, and d, respectively, which yields

aλv̄003+bλ+μ2v̄013+cμ1v̄103+dμ1+μ2v̄113=aπ00+μ2v̄012+bπ01+μ1v̄103+v̄113+cπ10+λv̄003+μ2v̄112+dπ11+λv̄013

We want to set the coefficients such that moving all v̄q̄3 terms to the left-hand side yields q̄Qv̄q̄3; that is, find a, b, c, and d that satisfies

λaλc=1λ+μ2bλd=1μ1cμ1b=1μ1+μ2dμ1b=1

which has solution

a=1λ+1μ1+1μ2,b=1μ2,c=1μ1+1μ2,d=1μ2.

Combining Eqs 8a8d with respective coefficients a, b, c, and d yields

q̄Qv̄q̄3=aπ00+bπ01+cπ10+dπ11+aμ2v̄012+cμ2v̄112.

To find aμ2v̄012+cμ2v̄112, we again take linear combinations of Eqs 8e,8f, and we need to find the coefficients a′ and b′ that satisfy

λ+μ2aλb=aμ2μ1+μ2bμ1a=cμ2

which has solution

a=μ1+μ2λλ+μ1+μ2+1μ1+1μ2,b=1μ1+μ1μ1+μ2a.

The last linear combination of equations is for (Eq. 8g) and (Eq. 8h) to find μ1av̄101, and the coefficients satisfy

μ1a=μ1aμ1+μ2bμ2a=0

with solution

a=a,b=μ2μ1+μ2a.

Finally, we have

Δ=aπ00+b+aπ01+c+aπ10+d+b+bπ11

After much simplification, we have our first result:

3.2 Three (equal rate) ⋅/M/1/1 queues in tandem

In this section, we build on the previous case and now consider three queues in tandem, for the case where the servers have equal service rate. Again we use the stochastic hybrid systems approach and the discrete state set is Q={000,001,010,011,100,101,110,111}, where q1q2q3Q, qi = 1 indicates that queue i has a packet in service, and qi = 0 indicates when the queue is empty. Using the same approach for the two-queue case, we derive the following expression for the average age:

3.3 Numerical/simulation results

To verify our theoretical results, we look at the ⋅/M/1/1 queues with Poisson arrivals for up to four queues in tandem. The results for the average age as a function of λ are given in Figure 4. For comparison, we plot the numerically evaluated theoretical expressions for the average age up to three queues in tandem, and we observe that the plot lines for the theoretical and simulated results lie on top of one another. We also plot the minima from simulation and compare with (Eq. 11), which evaluates to 2.414 for m = 2. This matches with the simulation. We observe that the minimum λ is decreasing as the number of queues increases. For comparison, the case with preemption in Yates (2022) is shown alongside the non-preemptive case in Figure 5. The age for the preemptive case is lower than that of the non-preemptive case by about 40% at each point in the tandem network. We also consider the expression in (Eq. 10), which is exact for m = 1, 2 but is an approximation for m = 3, 4. Figure 6 shows the simulated, theoretical, and approximate results for m = 3, 4. The approximation overestimates the average age with a gap that increases with λ. For large λ, the approximation is only off by about 5% in the three-queue case. However, it is closer to 7% in the four-queue case, which suggests that the approximation may not scale well.

FIGURE 4
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FIGURE 4. Average age vs. λ, μ = 1, queue capacity of one, without preemption. Simulation results are indicated by the points, theoretical results are indicated by the solid line, and simulation minima are indicated by △.

FIGURE 5
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FIGURE 5. Average age vs. λ, μ = 1, queue capacity of one, preemption vs. non-preemption.

FIGURE 6
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FIGURE 6. Average age vs. λ, μ = 1, queue capacity of one after three and four queues (vs. approximation).

We also numerically evaluate (13) for a two-queue system with different service rates, 0.5 and 1, and the average age is plotted in Figure 7. It can be seen that the plot lines for the average age after two queues are right on top of each other, which demonstrates that the average age after the second queue is indeed insensitive to the ordering of the servers (as previously stated). To further validate this claim, we simulate a three-queue system with different service rates; that is, 0.33, 0.67, and 1. We plot the average age for different permutations of service rates in Figure 8. The average age after three queues is the same for all three permutations, which is further proof that the order of servers in the tandem does not impact the average age after the last queue.

FIGURE 7
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FIGURE 7. Average age vs. λ, different μ1, μ2 queue capacity of one, non-preemption.

FIGURE 8
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FIGURE 8. Average age vs. λ, different μ1, μ2, μ3, queue capacity of one, non-preemption.

4 Average age of two ⋅/M/1/∞ queues in tandem

We next consider the case of infinite capacity first-come, first-served queues in tandem with Poisson arrival process and exponential servers. To derive the age after two queues, we use a graphical approach as in Kaul et al. (2012a) to derive the average age going after the second queue based on the average age after the first queue. We will show that for each packet i, the additional area under the age function beyond the age after the first queue is XT ′, where X is the interarrival time at the first queue and T′ is the system time in the second queue.

Theorem 3. The average age after two infinity capacity queues in tandem (M/M/1/∞ → ⋅/M/1/∞) is given by

ΔM/M/1,2=ΔM/M/1,1+λEXT=1λ+1μ1+λ2μ12μ1λ+1μ2+λ22μ2λ+λ2μ1μ2μ1+μ2λ.(13)

Proof. An example of the evolution of the age function after queue 2 is shown in Figure 9. To derive the average age (1) using the graphical method, we calculate the total area under the age function by breaking it up into geometric shapes and then calculate their areas separately. The age function after queue 1, ΔM/M/1,1(t), is shown in the figure by a dotted line, which is bounded above by the age after queue 2, ΔM/M/1,2(t). We seek to calculate the remaining area under the age function after accounting for the average age ΔM/M/1,1.

FIGURE 9
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FIGURE 9. Age computation at (M/M/1) queue n based on age at queue n − 1.

At time t0, the packet is served at queue 1 and arrives at queue 2. At the origin of the plot (t0), the packet is served at queue 2 and the age after queue 2 (ΔM/M/1,2) is defined. From t0 until another packet arrives and is served at queue 1 (t1), the ages after both queues are the same. At the service time t1 at queue 1, the age ΔM/M/1,1(t) resets to the lower age but the age ΔM/M/1,2(t) does not yet reset to the age of the packet until it is served at t1. The amount that the age is reduced by is equal to the difference between the ages of consecutive packets, which is equal to the interarrival time X1 into queue 1. The area of the parallelogram is given by the X1 times the system time in queue 2, T1=t1t1.

The average age at queue 2 is given by

ΔM/M/1,2=limT1T0TΔM/M/1,2tdt=limT1T0TΔM/M/1,1tdt+RTT+NTTi=1NTTiXiNT=ΔM/M/1,1+λETX(14)

where N(T) is the number of update packets served before time T and R(T) is the residual area under the curve less the area under ΔM/M/1,1(t). The arrival rate into queue 2 is λ and R(T)/T disappears in the limit, provided λ < μ2. The age after the first queue ΔM/M/1,1 can be found in Kaul et al. (2012a).

To derive E[T′X], we have E[TiXi]=E[Xi(Wi+Si)]=E[WiXi]+E[X]E[S]. The waiting time can be written as Wi=(Ti1Yi)+, where (x)+ = max(0, x) and Yi is the interdeparture time of the first queue. We consider two cases for the interdeparture time. If the interarrival time for packet i is less than the system time for packet i − 1 (Xi ≤ Ti−1), then packet i immediately begins service and the interdeparture time is Yi = Si. Otherwise, Yi = XiTi1 + Si. By combining these two cases, we can write Yi=(XiTi1)++Si. The conditional expected waiting time at the second queue Wi given the interarrival time at the first queue Xi = x is given by

EWi|Xi=x=ETi1Yi+|Xi=x=ETi1xTi1+Si+.

Note that Ti1 and Ti−1 are independent of the service time and interarrival time of future packets, including Si and Xi. In addition, for the pair of M/M/1/∞ → ⋅/M/1/∞ queues in tandem, the system times Ti and Ti are independent of one another (Karpelevitch and Kreinin (1992)). By Burke’s Theorem (Burke (1956)), the departure process from the first queue is Poisson with rate λ, so the second queue can also be viewed as an independent M/M/1 queue and the service time distribution for each queue is given by fT(t)=(μ2λ)e(μ2λ)t. Therefore, we have

EWi|Xi=x=00xx+sttx+tsfTtfTtfSsdtdtds+0xstsfTtfTtfSsdtdtds=μ1μ2λμ1μ2μ1+μ2λμ1λeμ2λxμ2λeμ1λx.(15)

Using (Eq. 15), we can solve for E[W′X]:

EWX=0xEWi|Xi=xfXxdx=0μ1μ2λμ1μ2μ1+μ2λμ1λxeμ2xμ2λxeμ1xdx=λμ22μ2λ+λμ1μ2μ1+μ2λ.

Finally, we can substitute this into λE[T′X] = λ(E[W′X] + EXES) = λE[W′X] + 1/μ2, which can be substituted into (Eq. 14) to complete the proof.

From Eq. 14, we can see that even when the service rates are different, the average age does not depend on the order of the servers. Also recall that the order of servers did not affect the average age for single-capacity queues.

This proof for two infinite capacity queues can be extended beyond two queues. However, this would be cumbersome because of the calculation of the conditional waiting time at the last queue given the interarrival time at the first queue and would require the cases where the interarrival/interdeparture times are longer or shorter than the system times to be tracked.

We evaluated the theoretical result for 1 M/M/1/∞ and the M/M/1/∞ → ⋅/M/1/∞ (Eq. 13), and then simulated for up to four queues in tandem; the results are shown in Figure 10. The plot lines for the simulations and numerically evaluated expressions after 1 and 2 queues lie on top of one another. We also include the minimum for each curve on the plot (indicated by △) and we see that the λ that minimizes the average age again decreases as the number of queues increases. Under these settings with Poisson arrival and exponential service times, the performance can be improved by backing off from the previously optimal packet generation rate λ as the number of queues increases. In Figure 11, we plot the age for two cases of heterogeneous queues in tandem: a) where μ1 = 0.5 and μ2 = 1 (solid line), and b) where μ1 = 1 and μ2 = 0.5 (dotted line). As we noted from the expression in Eq. 14, the order of the servers does not affect the average age after the second queue. We simulated this for three cases of three queues in Figure 12 and we observe that the average age after the third queue is the same in all three cases (and for all other permutations of queue orders not shown here).

FIGURE 10
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FIGURE 10. Average age vs. λ, μ = 1, infinite queue capacity.

FIGURE 11
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FIGURE 11. Average age vs. λ, different μ1, μ2, infinite queue capacity.

FIGURE 12
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FIGURE 12. Average age vs. λ, different μ1, μ2, μ3, infinite queue capacity.

5 Simulation results for k capacity queues

To study the regime between single-capacity and infinite capacity queues in tandem, we simulate the average AoI for k capacity queues in tandem (kZ+) with equal service rate μ. The results are shown in Figures 13A–D after 1–4 queues, with k = 1, 5, 10, ∞ in each plot. We observe that for finite capacity queues, the average age approaches some finite value as the arrival rate increases, and that the difference between this value and the minimum is increasingly greater for larger capacity queues. Thus, optimizing the arrival rate becomes critical very quickly, even for relatively small capacity queues.

FIGURE 13
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FIGURE 13. Average age vs. \λ, \μ = 1, k queue capacity. (A) 1 queue, (B) 2 queues in tandem, (C) 3 queues in tandem, (D) 4 queues in tandem.

The optimal arrival rate vs. queue capacity is shown in Figure 14 for queue capacity up to six. We observe that the optimal λ very quickly approaches the optimal for infinite capacity queues (dashed line). We have also plotted the optimal age in Figure 15 and again the optimal age for infinite capacity queues is quickly approached. These results suggest that the optimal age is very sensitive to queue capacity between the values of one and six. Meanwhile, for larger queue capacities, it suffices to optimize for infinite capacity queues. This can be easier to analyze theoretically, such as in the case for two queues in tandem. We have simulated this for different service rates μ = 0.1 and μ = 10, and have observed very similar behavior. Consequently, this result is insensitive to service rate.

FIGURE 14
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FIGURE 14. Optimal λ vs. queue capacity, μ = 1. The dotted line is the optimal λ for infinite capacity queues.

FIGURE 15
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FIGURE 15. Optimal average age vs. queue capacity, μ = 1. The dotted line is the optimal age for infinite capacity queues.

6 Summary

In this work, we have analyzed the average AoI for non-preemptive queues in tandem, which is important for understanding how to control and optimize multi-hop networks for information freshness. For systems with Poisson arrivals and exponential service times, we applied the stochastic hybrid systems modeling approach to derive closed form expressions for the average age after two queues in tandem with capacity 1 and different service rates, as well as for the average age after three queues in tandem with equal service rates. Based on the average age expressions for one and two queues in tandem with equal service rates, we consider an approximation for m queues in tandem, which is shown to overestimate the age for the m = 3 and m = 4 cases with a gap that increases with λ. We have also derived the closed form expression for the average age after two infinite capacity queues with equal service rates. Finally, we studied other queue capacities k besides one and infinity. We observed that even for very small values of k, the optimal λ and age are close to that of the infinite capacity queue case.

Data availability statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article; further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.

Author contributions

CK and SK contributed to conception and design of the study. CK conducted the analysis, simulations, and wrote the manuscript. Both authors contributed to manuscript revision, read, and approved the submitted version.

Funding

This work was funded by the Office of Naval Research.

Acknowledgments

The content of this manuscript has been presented in part at MILCOM 2018 (Kam et al., 2018).

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Footnotes

1In Koukoutsidis (2020), they incorrectly assume E[Sic,1nDic]=E[Sic,1nAic], where for a packet class c, Sic,1n is the sojourn time for the ith packet, Dic is the interdeparture time between packet i and i + 1, and Aic is the interarrival time between packet i − 1 and i.

2We have verified that simulation results do not match the numerical results from the expression in Koukoutsidis (2020) but the simulations validate our expression.

3In Yates (2018), the authors were able to simplify the derivation for any number of preemptive queues in tandem by using a “fake updates” trick to reduce the number of states to a single state. However, this trick does not work in the system here with non-preemptive queues. Consequently, we have the number of states being 2m, where m is the number of queues.

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Appendix: Proof of Theorem 2

Similar to the two-queue case, the states 0q2q3 all have outgoing transitions through arrivals into queue 1 of rate λ, and there is an outgoing transition of rate μ for each occupied queue. For incoming transitions, the states 1q2q3 have a transition of rate λ from 0q2q3 and there is a transition of rate μ from a state where qi = 1 to a state where qi = 0 and qi+1 = 1 or if i = 3, so that the queue is followed by the monitor. The resulting global balance equations are given as follows:

λπ̄000=μπ̄001λ+μπ̄001=μπ̄010+π̄011λ+μπ̄010=μπ̄011+π̄100+π̄110λ+2μπ̄011=μπ̄101+π̄111μπ̄100=λπ̄000+μπ̄1012μπ̄101=λπ̄001+μπ̄110+π̄1112μπ̄110=λπ̄010+μπ̄1113μπ̄111=λπ̄011

with the solution

π̄000=μ3λ+μ3,π̄001=λμ2λ+μ3,π̄010=λμ5λ+8μ8λ+μ3,π̄011=3λ2μ8λ+μ3,π̄100=λλ2+3λμ+4μ24λ+μ3,π̄101=λ2λ+3μ4λ+μ3,π̄110=λ23λ+4μ8λ+μ3,π̄111=λ38λ+μ3.

Similar to the global balance equations, the steady-state correlation between discrete and age states satisfy (6), which for the age at the monitor v̄q4 gives us the following equations:

λv̄0004=π000+μv̄0013λ+μv̄0014=π001+μv̄0104+v̄0114λ+μv̄0104=π010+μv̄1004+v̄1104+v̄0113λ+2μv̄0114=π011+μv̄1014+v̄1114μv̄1004=π100+λv̄0004+μv̄10132μv̄1014=π101+λv̄0014+μv̄1104+v̄11142μv̄1104=π110+λv̄0104+μv̄11133μv̄1114=π111+λv̄0114.

Using a similar approach as in the two-queue case, we take linear combinations of these equations to yield q̄Qv̄q̄4 when we move all v̄q̄4 terms to the left-hand side, such that the coefficients must satisfy

aλeλ=1bλ+μfλ=1cλ+μbμgλ=1dλ+2μbμhλ=1eμcμ=12fμdμ=12gμcμfμ=13hμdμfμ=1,

which is achieved with solution

a=1λ+3μ,b=1μ,c=2μ,d=1μe=3μ,f=1μ,g=2μ,h=1μ.

The linear combination of equations yields the following:

q̄Qv̄q̄4=1λ+3μπ000+1μπ001+2μπ010+1μπ011+2μπ100+1μπ101+2μπ110+1μπ111+μλ+3v̄0013+2v̄0113+3v̄1013+2v̄1113

Next we need to find (μλ+3)v̄0013+2v̄0113+3v̄1013+2v̄1113, which is a function of the correlation functions for the age at the third queue v̄q3. To find this expression, we take linear combinations of the corresponding equations shown here:

λ+μv0013=π001+μv0102+v0113λ+2μv0113=π011+μv1013+v11132μv1013=π101+λv0013+μv1102+v11133μv1113=π111+λv0113

such that their coefficients satisfy

aλ+μcλ=μλ+3bλ+2μaμdλ=2c2μbμ=3d3μbμcμ=2.

The solution for the coefficients is given by

a=8λ3+33λ2μ+39λμ2+12μ33λμλ+2μ2b=7λ+12μ3μλ+4μ+2μλ+4μac=8λ+24μ3μλ+4μ+μλ+4μad=7λ+20μ3μλ+4μ+μλ+4μa.

Next we find aμv̄0102+cμv̄1102 via linear combinations of

λ+μv0102=π010+μv1001+v1102+v0112λ+2μv0112=π011+μv1011+v11122μv1102=π110+λv0102+μv11123μv1112=π111+λv0112.

This is achieved with coefficients that satisfy

aλ+μcλ=aμbλ+2μaμdλ=0c2μaμ=cμd3μbμcμ=0,

which has solution

a=8λ2+24λμ3μλ+2μλ+4μ+3λμ+8μ2λ+2μλ+4μab=4λ3μλ+2μ+μλ+2μac=8λ2+32λμ+24μ23μλ+2μλ+4μ+2λμ+5μ2λ+2μλ+4μad=4λ2+16λμ+8μ23μλ+2μλ+4μ+λμ+3μ2λ+2μλ+4μa.

The last set of equations used to find aμv̄1001+bμv̄1011 is given by

μv1001=π100+μv10112μv1011=π101+μv1101+v11112μv1101=π110+μv11113μv1111=π111,

and the coefficients must satisfy

aμ=aμb2μaμ=bμc2μbμ=0d3μbμcμ=0,

which has solution

a=a=8λ2+24λμ3μλ+2μλ+4μ+3λμ+8μ2λ+2μλ+4μab=a+b2=6λ2+20λμ3μλ+2μλ+4μ+2λμ+6μ2λ+2μλ+4μac=a+b4=3λ2+10λμ3μλ+2μλ+4μ+λμ+3μ2λ+2μλ+4μad=a+b4=3λ2+10λμ3μλ+2μλ+4μ+λμ+3μ2λ+2μλ+4μa.

We substitute the values into

q̄Qv̄q̄4=1λ+3μπ000+1μ+aπ001+2μ+aπ010+1μ+b+bπ011+3μ+aπ100+1μ+c+bπ101+2μ+c+cπ110+1μ+d+d+dπ111

which, after much simplification, yields the final result.

Keywords: communications and networking, real-time systems, semantic data and service, sensor and actuator networks, age of information

Citation: Kam C and Kompella S (2022) On the age of information for non-preemptive queues in tandem. Front. Comms. Net 3:932111. doi: 10.3389/frcmn.2022.932111

Received: 29 April 2022; Accepted: 23 September 2022;
Published: 02 November 2022.

Edited by:

Harpreet S. Dhillon, Virginia Tech, United States

Reviewed by:

Praful Mankar, International Institute of Information Technology, India
Mohamed Abd-Elmagid, Virginia Tech, United States

Copyright © 2022 Kam and Kompella. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Clement Kam, clement.kam@nrl.navy.mil

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.