Multigranular optical router for future networks

The future optical network needs to offer dynamic bandwidth allocation with the ability to adapt to application bandwidth requirements by providing transport granularity at the appropriate bit rate. A key element in such a network is a high-speed multigranular optical router that is able to support wavelength and subwavelength switching. This paper proposes advanced switching and router technologies suitable for such a network. A generic architecture for a multigranular optical switch comprising optical wavelength switching, optical time division multiplexing, optical packet switchng, and optical burst switching is proposed followed by specific designs for each part of the multigranular switch. This includes a design for an optical time-slot switch followed by a design for optical-packet- and burst-switched core and edge routers. Finally, an example is provided to show how these technologies can be combined to provide connectivity for applications with different bandwidth granularities. (C) 2008 Optical Society of America