Abstract

In line with the established observations in the electronic domain, some initial studies have confirmed that the performance of an optical packetswitched network is degraded dramatically under self-similar traffic load.¹ Especially in an unslotted optical network conveying the variable-length packets, the packet loss rate (PLR) increases to an unacceptably high level, mainly resulting from the frequent contentions occurring at the switching nodes.

© 2002 Optical Society of America