Highly spectral efficient networks based on grouped optical path routing.

Area of Science:

• Optical networking
• Telecommunications engineering
• Signal processing

Background:

• Optical filtering at network nodes causes signal spectrum narrowing, necessitating guard bands that reduce fiber frequency utilization.
• Existing architectures face challenges in balancing spectrum narrowing mitigation with efficient frequency usage.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose a novel grouped routing based network architecture to minimize signal spectrum narrowing.
• To significantly improve the spectral efficiency of optical fibers.
• To develop network design and control algorithms for static and dynamic traffic growth.

Main Methods:

• Implementing coarse granular routing at the grouped routing entity (GRE) level within Reconfigurable Optical Add-Drop Multiplexing (ROADM) nodes.
• Utilizing fine granular add/drop functionality to maintain high frequency utilization.
• Packing optical channels densely within each GRE and inserting guard bands between GREs.
• Developing network design and control algorithms compatible with current Liquid Crystal on Silicon (LCOS)-based ROADMs, requiring only control schema modifications.

Main Results:

• The proposed architecture effectively minimizes signal spectrum narrowing.
• High spectral efficiency is achieved through dense channel packing within GREs.
• Extensive simulations confirmed the architecture's effectiveness in managing both static and dynamic traffic.

Conclusions:

• The grouped routing architecture offers a viable solution to enhance spectral efficiency in optical networks.
• The proposed method allows for improved frequency utilization without requiring hardware changes in existing ROADM nodes.
• The developed algorithms support adaptable network management for evolving traffic demands.