A Self-Checking Switching Element for a Fault-Tolerant Multistage Interconnection Network

Multistage Interconnection Networks (MINs) are used to provide high bandwidth at a reasonable cost. MINs are designed for n=m sup n inputs and N outputs, and consist of n stages of mxm crossbar switches. The switches in adjacent stages are connected in such a way that there exists a path from any input to any output. A shuffle-exchange MIN for N=2 sub 4 is given in Figure 1. This network has the perfect-shuffle pattern of interconnection between adjacent stages.