Monolithic integration of semiconductor optical switches for optical interconnects

Switches with nanosecond transition times and broad optical bandwidth are investigated for high-capacity low-latency switched optical interconnection. Wavelength multiplexing is exploited for both reduced latency, enhanced capacity and functionality, while using off-the-shelf transceiver technology. The requirement for optical header processing, wavelength translation, and optical buffering is avoided. The design, fabrication and assessment of compact integrated add-drop multiplexers are proposed and demonstrated for application in low-cost wavelength multiplexed and switched optical interconnects. A low-power sub-mm amplifying 2×2 switched is characterised by four wavelength channel low penalty transmission. Control schemes are proposed and demonstrated to facilitate 80 Gb/s optically switched networking.