Abstract

Recent demand increase for the multimedia services such as Internet, VOD, video conference etc., show promising requirements for the transmission network evolution toward high capacity, highly flexible and low cost photonic networks. The future photonic system should have more than 100 times larger capacity in bit rate compared with the present POTS based network. Bit rate in access network will increase to Gb/s range, and that for trunklike network will increase to several hundred Gb/s or Tb/s range. The photonic network technology, which include WDM (wavelength division multiplexing), photonic switching, OTDM (optical time division multiplexing) will open the possibility of such high performance future photonic networks. Several technical breakthroughs are still required in the research and development stages for device, component, equipment, system and network area.

© 1996 Optical Society of America