The University of Southampton
University of Southampton Institutional Repository

The future of optical communications technologies

The future of optical communications technologies
The future of optical communications technologies
The extraordinary progress of optical communications over the last decade or so has led some commentators to suggest that the photonics community has done too good a job in satisfying the demand for bandwidth. In hindsight, historians and economists will point out that a glut of any commodity, in this case bandwidth, inevitably results in a crash in the market. While this may be the case at present, the underlying growth in optical telecommunication remains firm and will surely eventually stabilise. The challenge is to develop the technologies that will be required once the market returns. It is very clear that cost is the next challenge. For the first time, many research laboratories have scaled back their advanced work on 40Gbit/s systems and above, multi-wavelength terabit transmission and large-scale optical switches to focus on low-cost platform technologies. While integration is widely accepted as the route to cost reduction, it is far from clear which of these will offer the greatest opportunity for production on a large scale. None can at present integrate light generation, detection, switching, filtering, modulation, amplification and, most difficult of all, isolation. While there is hope for new approaches, such as nano-technology and photonic bandgaps, currently the approach is to design around limitations and develop new subsystem architectures which offer component sharing and associated cost benefits. The talk will review some of the component technologies which continue to impact the progress towards lower cost photonic networks and speculate on new developments.
Payne, D.N.
4f592b24-707f-456e-b2c6-8a6f750e296d
Payne, D.N.
4f592b24-707f-456e-b2c6-8a6f750e296d

Payne, D.N. (2000) The future of optical communications technologies. Northern Optics/EOSAM 2000, Uppsala, Sweden. 05 - 07 Jun 2000.

Record type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)

Abstract

The extraordinary progress of optical communications over the last decade or so has led some commentators to suggest that the photonics community has done too good a job in satisfying the demand for bandwidth. In hindsight, historians and economists will point out that a glut of any commodity, in this case bandwidth, inevitably results in a crash in the market. While this may be the case at present, the underlying growth in optical telecommunication remains firm and will surely eventually stabilise. The challenge is to develop the technologies that will be required once the market returns. It is very clear that cost is the next challenge. For the first time, many research laboratories have scaled back their advanced work on 40Gbit/s systems and above, multi-wavelength terabit transmission and large-scale optical switches to focus on low-cost platform technologies. While integration is widely accepted as the route to cost reduction, it is far from clear which of these will offer the greatest opportunity for production on a large scale. None can at present integrate light generation, detection, switching, filtering, modulation, amplification and, most difficult of all, isolation. While there is hope for new approaches, such as nano-technology and photonic bandgaps, currently the approach is to design around limitations and develop new subsystem architectures which offer component sharing and associated cost benefits. The talk will review some of the component technologies which continue to impact the progress towards lower cost photonic networks and speculate on new developments.

This record has no associated files available for download.

More information

Published date: June 2000
Venue - Dates: Northern Optics/EOSAM 2000, Uppsala, Sweden, 2000-06-05 - 2000-06-07

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 38212
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/38212
PURE UUID: 18221576-634d-4f0b-9dff-9bf4f6881157

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 06 Jun 2006
Last modified: 11 Dec 2021 15:39

Export record

Download statistics

Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.

View more statistics

Atom RSS 1.0 RSS 2.0

Contact ePrints Soton: eprints@soton.ac.uk

ePrints Soton supports OAI 2.0 with a base URL of http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/cgi/oai2

This repository has been built using EPrints software, developed at the University of Southampton, but available to everyone to use.

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive cookies on the University of Southampton website.

×