A NONBLOCKING ARCHITECTURE FOR A WAVELENGTH-DIVISION MULTIPLEXING PHOTONIC SWITCHING NETWORK

The authors previously derived the condition for a non-blocking archit ecture in a wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) photonic switching network, i.e., the generalized parallel delta network (GPDN) [1]. GPDN is configured as a multi-stage link connection of multiple unit switc hes, where the hardware complexity can be adjusted by varying the numb er of stages according to the network size. It can provide a framework for network design of various trunk networks, access networks, and in -station networks. This paper presents an architecture for a wavelengt h division multiplexing photonic unit switch that is applicable to a w avelength division multiplexing photonic switching network (GPDN), and evaluates the cost. The proposed wavelength division multiplexing pho tonic unit switch is constructed by assuming the situation in which an optical signal is multiplexed and handled without being converted to an electrical signal and employing the wavelength division multiplexin g technique. The latter is considered promising for future networks fr om the viewpoint of reducing hardware complexity and economizing broad band communication. The input call to the carrier is wavelength conver ted to the carrier corresponding to the required outlet. Then, an opti cal filter is used to realize spatial switching. By combining the phot onic unit switches proposed here, a large-scale switching network can be constructed. (C) 1998 Scripta Technica.