All-optical header recognizer for optical packet switched networks : exploiting nonlinear gain and index dynamics in semiconductor optical amplifiers for low power operation and photonic integration device

The increase of the internet traffic leads to future optical networks requiring tens of Tb/s of capacity. Current electronic circuit switches are limited by the scalability of the electronic switching fabrics, power consumption and dissipation in the opto- electronic conversion. All-optical packet switches may solve the bottleneck between the required capacity and the routing speed. All-optical header processing systems (AOHPS) is a key function in implementing the all-optical packet switch. The book focuses on AOPHS solutions based on nonlinear gain and index dynamics in semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOA). One approach is based on two-pulse correlation principles in SOAs combined with a header pre-processor for recognizing a large amount of packet headers. Another approach employs the self-induced nonlinear polarization rotation in SOAs. This has the advantage to reduce drastically the optical powers of operation. A third AOHPS employs a terahertz optical asymmetric demultiplexers (TOADs), which has the advantage to be made compact and thus allows the photonic integration of the system. Finally a comparison between the different techniques is reported.