In multimedia communication networks, the problem of multicasting assu
mes a new dimension. Apart from minimizing the cost of multicast commu
nication, it is also necessary to ensure that each of the destination
nodes receives the message within a bounded delay. Such delay-bounded
multicast applications typically arise in multimedia conferencing. In
this paper, we present a genetic algorithm for solving the delay-bound
ed multicast problem. We assume source-based routing, i.e. each source
node completely determines the Steiner tree along which multicasting
is performed. The genetic algorithm is a powerful optimization tool, a
nd our experimental results reveal that a genetic algorithm provides f
ast and superior quality solutions to the delay-bounded multicast prob
lem. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V.