If you create a node which publishes once on a latching topic, and then bring a subscriber up and down, the list of connections in the publisher seems to just keep growing.

Terminal 1:
{{{
$ rostopic pub chatter std_msgs/String foo
}}}

Terminal 2:
{{{
$ rosrun rospy_tutorials listener.py ^C
$ rosrun rospy_tutorials listener.py ^C
$ rosrun rospy_tutorials listener.py ^C
$ rosnode info /rostopic_27665_1285637405612

...

Connections:

• topic: /chatter
  • to: /listener_27682_1285637409689
  • direction: outbound
  • transport: TCPROS
• topic: /chatter
  • to: /listener_27706_1285637411687
  • direction: outbound
  • transport: TCPROS
• topic: /chatter
  • to: /listener_27729_1285637413320
  • direction: outbound
  • transport: TCPROS
    }}}

The connection list seems to get reset on publication.

trac data:

• Owner: kwc
• Reporter: leibs
• Reported at: Mon Sep 27 18:35:07 2010
• URL: https://code.ros.org/trac/ros/ticket/3038