Topological Properties of Some

Interconnection Network Graphs

Robert Cimikowski
Computer Science Department
Montana State University
E-mail: cimo@cs.montana.edu
Abstract

Interconnection networks play a vital role in parallel computing

architectures. We investigate topological properties of some networks
proposed for parallel computation, based on their underlying graph
models. The vertices of the graph correspond to processors and the
edges represent communication links between processors. Parameters such as crossing number and thickness strongly aect the area
required to lay out the corresponding circuit on a VLSI chip. In
particular, we give upper bounds for the skewness, crossing number,
and thickness of several networks including the mesh of trees, reduced
mesh of trees, 2-dimensional torus, butter y, wrapped butter y, and
Benes graph.

1 Introduction
Many dierent interconnection networks have been proposed for parallel
computer architectures. Examples include the linear array, mesh (grid),
torus, mesh of trees, hypercube, star, butter y, and pancake. The text
by Leighton [6] describes a variety of parallel network topologies and algorithms. A network is modelled as an undirected graph where the vertices denote the processing elements and the edges denote the bidirectional
communication channels (wires). Some desirable features for a good interconnection network include low degree, regularity, small diameter, large
bisection width, and high fault tolerance (connectivity). These parameters
aect the computational performance of the network. In addition, it is
important to minimize the amount of area consumed by the circuit layout,
which contributes largely to the overall cost of fabricating the chip. In [7]
it is shown that the crossing number of a graph strongly in uences the layout area required. Also, the thickness of a graph indicates the minimum
1

number of planar layers required to lay out the graph. Finally, when a single planar layer is required, it is desirable to remove the minimum number
(skewness) of \nonplanar" edges from the original graph.
In this paper, we investigate the above-mentioned topological properties of several networks proposed as models of parallel architectures. For
each network, we give upper bounds for the given parameters, based on a
combinatorial analysis of the adjacency structure of the underlying graphtheoretic model of the network.

2 Topological Invariants
Let G = (V; E ) be a graph. We will assume that G is simple and undirected. The crossing number of G,  (G), is the minimum number of edge
crossings in any planar drawing of G. The thickness of G, (G), is the
minimum number of planar subgraphs whose union is G. The skewness
of G, (G), is the minimum number of edges whose removal from G results
in a planar graph.
For arbitrary G, determining (G),  (G), and (G) are NP -hard (see
[3]). Hence, from a computational standpoint, it is infeasible to obtain exact
values for these parameters for graphs, in general. It is natural, then, to
explore bounds for the parameters. In the following sections of the paper,
we derive upper bounds for several dierent networks.

3 Two-Dimensional Toroidal Network

The 2-dimensional torus, Tm;n, is formed by an m  n grid (mesh) with

\wraparound" edges joining vertices in the rst and last row and rst and
last column (see Figure 1). Tm;n has mn vertices and 2mn edges and is 4regular and hamiltonian. Observe that Tm;n = Cm  Cn , where `' denotes
the cross product of two graphs.
Based on the drawing of T4;4 in Figure 1, we obtain the following upper
bound for the skewness of Tm;n:

Theorem 1. (Tm;n)  min(m; n).

Proof: Wlog let m = max(m; n). Now draw the m `wraparound' edges
as concentric arcs outside the m  n grid, producing 0 crossings. Then the
n interior `wraparound' edges, when removed, eliminate all crossings. 2

Figure 2 illustrates the proof for T4;4. The skewness is no more than 4
as indicated by removing the four bold `wraparound' edges in the gure.
2

Figure 1: Torus T4;4.

We conjecture, in fact, that (T4;4 ) = 4.

Corollary 1.1. (Tn;n)  n.

From Figure 2 and a similar argument, an upper bound for the number
of edge crossings in Tm;n can be derived:

Theorem 2.  (Tm;n)  min(m; n)
(max(m; n) ? 2).

Proof: When Tm;n is drawn as shown in Figure 2, each of the min(m; n)
interior `wraparound' edges intersects with exactly max(m; n) ? 2 vertical
edges, including max(m; n) ? 2 curved arcs in the bottom row, for a total
of min(m; n)
(max(m; n) ? 2) crossings. 2

Corollary 2.1.  (Tn;n)  n(n ? 2).

The thickness of Tm;n can now be inferred from Figure 2 and the previous arguments.

Theorem 3. (Tm;n) = 1 for m; n < 3, and (Tm;n) = 2, otherwise.

Proof: Draw all of the grid edges and the n vertical `wraparound' edges
in layer 1 and the m vertical wraparound edges in layer 2. 2

Figure 2: Torus T4;4 with \nonplanar" edges indicated.

4 Mesh of Trees

The n  n mesh of trees, Mn , has a complete binary tree in each row and
column. Hence, Mn is only dened for n a power of 2. Mn has 3n2 ? 2n
vertices and 4n2 ? 4n edges and is nonhamiltonian. M4 is shown in Figure
3.
Although M2 is planar, Mn is nonplanar for n  4, despite the relative
sparsity of edges. Trees in interior rows and columns obstruct planarity,
and by removing a small subset of these edges we can remove all planar
obstructions.

Theorem 4. (Mn) 

n?2)2 .

Proof: The trees in column 1 and row n can be ipped to the left
and down, resp., to eliminate some crossings. The remaining crossings are
caused by interior trees, which can be eliminated by removing one edge
from the root of each row tree. For larger trees, single edges from subtree
roots must also be removed. In general, if (n ? 2)=2 edges are removed from
each of the n ? 2 interior row trees, all crossings are eliminated. Hence,

(Mn )  (n ? 2)

log2 n?2
i=0

2i = (n ? 2)2log2 n?1 ? 1

Figure 3: 2-dimensional mesh of trees M4.

= (n=2 ? 1)(n ? 2) = (n ?2 2) : 2
2

Theorem 5.  (Mn)  (n ? 2) .
2

Proof: Consider the drawing of M4 in Figure 3. For each interior row

tree, the two edges incident with each root vertex cross with edges of the
corresponding column trees. The same holds true for any subtree root vertices. Hence, the number of crossings in Mn , when drawn in this fashion,
is the product of the number of interior row trees (n ? 2) and the number
of crossings caused by each tree (n ? 2). 2

Theorem 6. (Mn) = 2 for n  4.

Proof: Note that all row trees of Mn can be drawn in one layer and
all column trees can be drawn in another layer without crossings. Hence,
(Mn )  2. Also, note that Mn is nonplanar for n  4 since M4 can be
reduced to K4;4 by a series of edge contractions. Initially, each bivalent
vertex is replaced by a single edge. Subsequent contractions result in the
four row tree roots of M4 in one partition and the four column tree roots
in another. Hence, (Mn )  2. 2

Figure 4: 2-dimensional reduced mesh of trees RM4 .

5 Reduced Mesh of Trees

The n  n reduced mesh of trees, RMn, is a subgraph of Mn with only

n
log2 n row and column trees. In particular, RMn consists of an n  n array
with complete binary trees added to the (i log2n + 1)st row and column for
(n?1)
(n?1)
0  i < logn2 n . RMn has n2 + 2nlog
vertices and 4nlog
edges. Figure
2n
2n
4 shows a drawing of RM4 , which is planar. The reduction in the number
of trees in the rows and columns leads to upperbounds for skewness and
crossing number for RMn .
Theorem 7. (RMn)  (2nlog?2)2 n2 .
Proof: Since there are 1=log2n as many row and column trees, crossings
involving some of the edges are eliminated where they existed in Mn; hence,
the upper bound is immediate. 2

Theorem 8.  (RMn) 

n?2)2
log2 n .

Proof: By the same argument as before, there are 1=log2n as many

crossings as in Mn ; hence, the bound is again immediate. 2

RM8 is edge contractible to K3;3 . Hence, RMn is nonplanar for n  8,

and the following result is immediate.

Theorem 9. (RMn) = 1 for n  4, and (RMn)  2 for n  8.

6

6 Hypercubic Networks
The hypercube has received considerable attention in the literature. A survey of its graph-theoretic properties can be found in [4]. Recent crossing
number results are given in [9, 10]. The power and utility of the hypercube are well known. A drawback, however, is that its vertex degree grows
logarithmically with the size of the network, which can present interconnection problems for machines with a very large number of processors. To
circumvent this problem, several bounded-degree derivatives of the hypercube have been proposed. They are commonly referred to as hypercubic
networks.

6.1 Butter y Network

The butter y network, also known as the \FFT network," was originally devised to implement FFT algorithms. The r-dimensional butter y, BFr , has
(r + 1)2r vertices, r2r+1 edges, maximum degree 4, and is nonhamiltonian.
The vertices correspond to pairs hw; ii where i is the level or dimension of
the vertex (0  i  r) and w is an r-bit binary number denoting the row
of the vertex. Two vertices hw; ii and hw0 ; i0 i are adjacent i i0 = i + 1 and
either w and w0 are identical, or w and w0 dier in precisely the ith bit.
Figure 5 shows drawings of BF2 and BF3 .
Note the highly recursive structure of BFr , e.g., BF3 contains two BF2
subgraphs joined together by an extra column of vertices on the left with
a set of `connecting' diagonal edges to the two subgraphs.
Although BF2 is planar, BFr is nonplanar for r > 2. We can eliminate
all crossings by removing a subset of the r2r diagonal edges of BFr . Note
that the number of `connecting' diagonal edges in BFr is 2r . Although
two of the `connecting' diagonals of BFr , one at the top and one at the
bottom (edges fa; bg and fc; dg of Figure 5), can be redrawn as exterior
arcs to eliminate some of the crossings, in BFr+1 one of these edges must
be retained as a `straight' diagonal edge in each copy of BFr , which has a
cancelling eect in the resulting recursive formula for skewness. Hence, we
obtain the recurrence (BFr )  2
(BFr?1 ) + 2r .
With initial conditions (BF2 )  2 and (BF3 )  12, we solve the
recurrence to obtain the following result giving an upper bound for the
skewness of BFr :

Theorem 10. (BFr )  r2r ? 3
2r? .

1

BF

2
d

BF

Figure 5: (a) Butter y BF2 (b) Butter y BF3 .

An upper bound for the number of crossings in BFr can be obtained
by counting the crossings in each level, based on the `straight-edge' drawings of Figure 5, and using the fact that some crossings can be eliminated
by redrawing some of the diagonal edges as exterior arcs. The number
of crossings in the two copies of BFr?1 is  2(2r?1 ? 1). The number
of `connector' diagonal crossings with horizontal edges is  2r (2r?1 ? 1).
The number of crossings between the `connector' edges alone is  (2r?1)2 .
Finally, we can reduce the last set of `connector' crossings by the sum
2
2r?1 ? 1 by drawing two of the edges as exterior arcs. Thus we have
 (BFr )  2
 (BFr?1 )+3
22r?2 ? 2r ? 1 = 2
 (BFr?1 )+3
22r?2 ? 2r ? 1.
The initial conditions are  (BF2 )  5,  (BF3 )  49, and  (BF4 )  273.
Solving the recurrence, we obtain the following result:

Theorem 11.  (BFr ) 

3 4r
2

? 3
2r ? r2r + 1.
8

It is easy to nd minimum planar decompositions for BF2 and BF3 .

Therefore, (BF2 ) = 1 and (BF3 ) = 2. It is not known, however, if BF4
is biplanar. The following result, however, is easy to show:

Theorem 12. (BFr )  3.

Proof: Place all horizontal edges in layer 1, all diagonal edges going one
direction in layer 2, and all diagonal edges going the opposite direction in
layer 3. Hence, we have a triplanar decomposition for BFr . 2

6.2 Wrapped Butter y Network

For computational purposes, the rst and last levels of the butter y are
sometimes merged into a single level with the respective vertices in each
row merged into one vertex. The result is an r-level `wrapped' butter y,
WBFr , with r2r vertices each of degree 4 and r2r+1 edges. Note that
WBFr is equivalent to BFr with the rst and last columns of nodes merged.
The `wrapped' edges join vertices in levels 1 and r. The `wrapped' butter y
network has been studied with regard to hamiltonian paths and cycles [1, 12]
and VLSI layout [5]. Figure 6 shows a drawing of WBF3 .
WBFr also has a recursive structure, i.e., WBFr contains two WBFr?1
subgraphs with an extra column (level 1) of 2r vertices on the left and a
set of outer `wrapped' arcs joining the level 1 and level r vertices of the two
subgraphs. WBF2 is planar, but WBFr is nonplanar for n  3.
We can eliminate all crossings in WBFr by removing a subset of the
inner diagonal and outer `wrapped' edges. Note that the number of outer
`wrapped' edges in WBFr is 2r . By removing half of these edges (2r?1 ),
the 2r crossing diagonal edges in level 2, and one diagonal edge from each
of the 2r?1 subgraphs in level r, we obtain a planar graph. The 2r?1
outer `wrapped' edges removed from WBFr are not present in WBFr+1
and hence have a cancelling eect when combined with the 2r?1 level r
diagonal edges removed. This leads to the recurrence (WBFr )  2

(WBFr?1 ) + 2r .
With the initial conditions (WBF3 )  16 and (WBF4 )  48, we
solve the recurrence to obtain the following result:

Theorem 13. (WBFr )  2r (r ? 1).

From the drawings in Figure 6, an upper bound for the number of
crossings in WBFr can be readily obtained. We consider each of the two
subgraphs consisting of the top (bottom) 2r =2 rows of vertices. In each subgraph, the number of crossings involving `wrapped' edges between vertices
in the same row is 2r?2(2r?2)+2r?2 (2r?2 ? 1), and the number of crossings
9

involving interior `straight' diagonal edges is 2r?1(2r?2 ? 1)+(2r?2)2 +2r?2.

The number of crossings involving the outer `wrapped' edges between the
two subgraphs is (2r?1)2 . Finally, the previous outer `wrapped' edge crossings of WBFr?1 in each of the subgraphs must be subtracted, giving the
recurrence  (WBFr )  2 (WBFr ? 1) + 2[2r?1(2r?2 ? 1) + (2r?2)2 +
2r?2 + (2r?2)2 + 2r?2(2r?2 ? 1)] + (2r?1 )2 ? 2(2r?2)2 . This can be simplied to  (WBFr )  2 (WBFr?1 ) + 3
22r?2 ? 2r . The initial conditions
are  (WBF3 )  48,  (WBF4 )  272, and  (WBF5 )  1280. Solving the
recurrence, we obtain the following result:

Theorem 14.  (WBFr ) 

3 4r
2

? 3
2 r ? r 2r .

WBF 3

Figure 6: Wrapped butter y WBF3 .

10

B3

Figure 7: (a) Benes graph B2 (b) Benes graph B3 .

By placing subsets of dierent edge types in dierent layers, we can
obtain a multi-layer planar embedding of WBFr . As noted before, WBFr
is nonplanar for r  3.

Theorem 15. (WBFr )  3.

Proof: Place all horizontal edges, all `wrapped' edges between vertices
in the same row, and one set of outer `wrapped' edges in layer 1 (i.e. the
set joining level 1 vertices of the top half of WBFr with the level r vertices
of the bottom half). Place the second set of outer `wrapped' edges and all
diagonal edges drawn in one direction in layer 2. Place the remaining set
of diagonal edges in layer 3. 2

6.3 Benes Network

The Benes network, Br , was introduced in [2]. Br consists of back-to-back
butter ies as shown in Figure 7. Overall, Br has r dimensions and 2r + 1
levels, each with 2r vertices. The rst and last r + 1 levels form a butter y
BFr . The number of edges in Br is 2r+2 + 22r and the maximum degree is
4. Br is nonhamiltonian.
11

It is straightforward to obtain an upper bound for the skewness of Br ,

based on the similar bound for BFr . Because of the back-to-back containment of the two BFr subgraphs, however, this reduces the number of
diagonal crossing edges which can be redrawn as non-crossing arcs. Notably, the crossing diagonals at all levels except for the rst and last cannot
be avoided. In the rst and last levels, one diagonal from each level can be
redrawn as an exterior arc to avoid crossings. Also, since Br contains two
copies of Br?1, the four diagonals redrawn as exterior arcs in Br?1 must
be redrawn as straight edges in Br . The number of crossings involving the
set of diagonals in each of the rst and last levels is 2r . Therefore, the
following recurrence is obtained: (Br )  2
(Br?1 ) + 2r+1 + 2. The
initial conditions are (B2 )  10, (B3 )  38, and (B4 )  110. Solving
the recurrence, we obtain the following result:

Theorem 16. (Br )  r2r ? 2r ? 2.

+1

An upper bound for the number of crossings in Br can be obtained

directly from Figure 7 by counting the crossings between edges of each
pair of adjacent levels. The number of crossings between the leftmost and
rightmost pairs of adjacent levels is 2(2r?1)2 + 2
2r (2r?1 ? 1). We must
also add in the 4(2r?1 ? 1) outer diagonal crossings of the four copies
of Br?1 which were not counted in the number of crossings for Br?1
when redrawn as exterior arcs. Finally, we can subtract the crossings involving two of the exterior diagonals of Br , since two of these edges can
be redrawn as exterior arcs. Therefore, the total number of crossings is
2
2r (2r?1 ? 1) + 4(2r?1 ? 1) + 2(2r?1)2 ? 2(2r?1 + 2r?1 ? 1). This leads
to the recurrence  (Br )  2
 (Br?1 ) + 3
22r?1 ? 2r+1 ? 2. The initial
conditions are  (B2 )  14,  (B3 )  106,  (B4 )  562, and  (B5 )  2594.
Solving the recurrence, we obtain the following result:

Theorem 17.  (Br )  3
4r ? 5
2r ? 2r2r + 2.

Br is nonplanar for r  2. Even B seems to require three planar layers.

Hence, the following result

Theorem 18. (Br )  3.

Proof: Place all horizontal edges in layer 1. Place all diagonal edges
drawn in one direction in layer 2 and the remaining diagonal edges drawn
in the opposite direction in layer 3. 2

12

7 Open Problems
There are three immediate open problems stemming from the research.
First, nding tighter upper bounds for the topological invariants is in order. We conjecture that the upper bounds given for the 2-dimensional torus
are in fact as tight as possible, but those for the remaining networks can
probably be improved. These would involve a deeper analysis of the structure of each network with regard to the containment of homeomorphs of
forbidden planar subgraphs.
Another problem is to nd lower bounds for the given parameters. Results of this type are known only for a few other networks, e.g. hypercube,
cube-connected cycles [9, 10, 11].
Finally, it would be interesting to investigate other parallel network
models with regard to these topological invariants, i.e., de Bruijn, pancake,
star, shue-exchange, generalized hypercube, k-ary hypercube (k > 2).

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