10 Optical buffer

In telecommunications, an optical buffer is a device that is capable of temporarily storing light. Just as in the case of a regular buffer, it is a storage medium that enables compensation for a difference in time of occurrence of events. More specifically, an optical buffer serves to store data that was transmitted optically (i.e., in the form of light), without converting it to the electrical domain.

Optical networks.Today, computer networks consist of optical fiber links, interconnected by electrical nodes. The data transport in the backbone is done in the form of light, typically from LED or laser. DWDM technologies enable bitrates well beyond 1 Tbit/s. However, at the nodes, this light has to be converted to the electronic domain, in order to switch all data to their separate destinations. Due to rapidly increasing channel capacities, the switching capacity is becoming the bottleneck of the system. Currently, research activities focus on optical switching technologies, that involve fewer or no conversions from the optical to the electronic domain. An important problem however, is the buffering.

September 26, 2011

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