  In this paper, we propose a solution to the distributed topology formation
problem for large-scale sensor networks with multi-source multicast flows. The
proposed solution is based on game-theoretic approaches in conjunction with
network coding. The proposed algorithm requires significantly low computational
complexity, while it is known as NP-hard to find an optimal topology for
network coding deployed multi-source multicast flows. In particular, we
formulate the problem of distributed network topology formation as a network
formation game by considering the nodes in the network as players that can take
actions for making outgoing links. The proposed solution decomposes the
original game that consists of multiple players and multicast flows into
independent link formation games played by only two players with a unicast
flow. We also show that the proposed algorithm is guaranteed to determine at
least one stable topology. Our simulation results confirm that the
computational complexity of the proposed solution is low enough for practical
deployment in large-scale networks.
