Article: A load-aware replica selection strategy with multi-armed bandits and adaptive redundancy in ICN Journal: International Journal of Information and Communication Technology (IJICT) 2026 Vol.27 No.51 pp.70 - 96 Abstract: With the rapid growth of data-intensive applications, achieving low-latency and reliable content retrieval in complex networks has become a major challenge. Information-centric networking (ICN) leverages content naming and pervasive in-network caching to enable retrieval from multiple replicas, making replica selection crucial for performance. However, selection is complicated by replica capacity limits, bursty workloads, and dynamic path variations. To address these issues, we propose a replica selection strategy that integrates the multi-armed bandit (MAB) framework with dynamic redundancy control. By modelling selection as an MAB problem, the strategy incorporates path variability, service heterogeneity, and blocking risk into decision-making, enabling adaptive exploration and exploitation. An additional load-aware redundancy mechanism adjusts redundancy levels to curb exploration overhead and suppress tail latency. Simulations on a real-world topology show that the method significantly reduces latency and improves robustness. Compared with nearest-replica routing, it reduces average latency by 32.09% and P99 tail latency by 45.76%. Inderscience Publishers - linking academia, business and industry through research

Title: A load-aware replica selection strategy with multi-armed bandits and adaptive redundancy in ICN

Authors: Wancai Zhang; Jianping Song; Rui Han

Addresses: National Network New Media Engineering Research Center, Institute of Acoustics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 21, North Fourth Ring Road, Haidian District, Beijing, 100190, China; School of Electronic, Electrical and Communication Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 19(A), Yuquan Road, Shijingshan District, Beijing, 100049, China ' National Network New Media Engineering Research Center, Institute of Acoustics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 21, North Fourth Ring Road, Haidian District, Beijing, 100190, China; School of Electronic, Electrical and Communication Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 19(A), Yuquan Road, Shijingshan District, Beijing, 100049, China ' National Network New Media Engineering Research Center, Institute of Acoustics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 21, North Fourth Ring Road, Haidian District, Beijing, 100190, China; School of Electronic, Electrical and Communication Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 19(A), Yuquan Road, Shijingshan District, Beijing, 100049, China

Abstract: With the rapid growth of data-intensive applications, achieving low-latency and reliable content retrieval in complex networks has become a major challenge. Information-centric networking (ICN) leverages content naming and pervasive in-network caching to enable retrieval from multiple replicas, making replica selection crucial for performance. However, selection is complicated by replica capacity limits, bursty workloads, and dynamic path variations. To address these issues, we propose a replica selection strategy that integrates the multi-armed bandit (MAB) framework with dynamic redundancy control. By modelling selection as an MAB problem, the strategy incorporates path variability, service heterogeneity, and blocking risk into decision-making, enabling adaptive exploration and exploitation. An additional load-aware redundancy mechanism adjusts redundancy levels to curb exploration overhead and suppress tail latency. Simulations on a real-world topology show that the method significantly reduces latency and improves robustness. Compared with nearest-replica routing, it reduces average latency by 32.09% and P99 tail latency by 45.76%.

Keywords: information-centric networking; ICN; multi-armed bandits; MAB; adaptive redundancy; in-network cache; replica selection.

DOI: 10.1504/IJICT.2026.153702

International Journal of Information and Communication Technology, 2026 Vol.27 No.51, pp.70 - 96

Received: 21 Nov 2025
Accepted: 09 Jan 2026
Published online: 21 May 2026 *

Title: A load-aware replica selection strategy with multi-armed bandits and adaptive redundancy in ICN

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