Abstract

Broadband access services in the era of 5G and beyond are driving the evolution of optical access networks from a fiber-to-the-home/ fiber-to-the-building infrastructure to a more common access platform, compatible with both wired and wireless broadband services. Accordingly, a flexible optical access network plays a pivotal role in catering to various service requirements. This work proposes a reconfigurable converged optical fronthaul network for wireless and wired services using a 4◊4 microring resonator (MRR) based silicon photonic (SiP) switch fabric. Reconfigurable service selection is demonstrated for wavelength selective, multicast and space switching scenarios. The reconfiguration of digital data and digital radio-over-fiber (DRoF) services for cloud radio access networks (C-RAN) is demonstrated.

Demonstration of a hybrid optical fiber–wireless 5G fronthaul coexisting with end-to-end 4G networks

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Fixed and Mobile Convergence: Which Role for Optical Networks?

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Future Proof Optical Network Infrastructure for 5G Transport

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Strategies for P2P connectivity in reconfigurable converged wired/wireless access networks

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Opt. Express 18(25) 26196-26205 (2010)

Quasi-Passive Optical Infrastructure for Future 5G Wireless Networks: Pros and Cons

Apurva S. Gowda, Leonid G. Kazovsky, Ke Wang, and David Larrabeiti
J. Opt. Commun. Netw. 8(12) B111-B123 (2016)