Voice/data integrated multiplexers employed in multimedia environments and random access networks using the Carrier Sensing Multiple Access protocols continue to be widely used in modern communications. Therefore, it is important that they be understood as completely as possible. One of the most important problems is to study their time dependent, or transient performance. This project's objectives are: 1) to obtain a theoretical and computational framework to evaluate the transient behavior of stochastic models for these networks, whose parameters may also be stationary or time dependent. 2) To evaluate the transient performance of voice/data integrated networks and multiaccess networks, which cannot be found using steady state analysis. Models to be analyzed are the voice/data integrated switches with movable boundary assignments, network models with more realistic descriptions of packet length arrival processes, multi-packet or multi-active-user arrivals, and the network stability analysis. 3) The design of some dynamic routing and control schemes in voice/data switches based on their time/dependent behaviors. 4) To generalize the approach to the study of more fundamental queueing problems.
