Dynamic Control Method of Queuing Delay with/without OEO Conversion in a Multi-Stage Access Network

To respond to the diverse requirements of user and services, various technologies have been researched for future access networks. In particular, the optical access system should support wider dynamic range in bandwidth and various quality of service (QoS) metrics like latency. To realize these needs, a hybrid architecture node with optical and electrical layers is very attractive. It has the advantage of enhancing the delay performance by handling traffic in the optical layer without optical-electrical -optical (OEO) conversion. As one such approach, we have been studying a multi-stage access network with/without OEO conversion based on semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs); it makes it easy to provide the delay performance that each service requires. In this paper, we propose a method for controlling the number of OEO conversions; it uses a token bucket technique to realize the desired queuing delay performance. With this technique, the number of OEO conversions can be dynamically and freely controlled regardless of the traffic condition.