Emerging trends in fiber optic networks

In the last few years, optical technology has shown how huge information traffic can be transmitted over a long distance. This success has permitted the commercialization of several high capacity point-to-point systems in terms of 10 Gbit/s single channel and N x 2.5 Gbit/s multichannel WDM systems. As far as the impact of optical technology in telecommunication networks is concerned, it is not yet clear how the high bit-rate signal can be used to optimize the telecommunication traffic. It is evident that the use of optical technology strongly depends on the type and requirements of an optical network. As an example, the operating conditions are much different for access and transport networks since the distance involved in the former is very short (0.1-10 km), whereas in the latter it is quite long (100-1000 km). In this paper, the status of optical transmission technology for telecommunication networks has been reviewed, showing problems and possible solutions for optical networks.