Spectral and energy efficiency considerations in mixed-line rate WDM networks with signal quality guarantee

Mixed-Line Rate (MLR) is a cost efficient solution to cope with the rapidly increasing and heterogeneous Internet traffic. In a MLR-based scenario wavelength channels are organized in groups (i.e., sub-bands), each of which consisting of channels operating at the same rate, e.g., it is possible to have on the same fiber link subbands operating at 10 Gbps, 40 Gbps, and 100 Gbps. In order to increase spectral efficiency one can reduce not only the channel spacing within a sub-band but also the frequency spacing between sub-bands operating at different rates, i.e., the sub-band spacing. On the other hand smaller sub-band spacing may: (i) negatively impact the transparent optical reach of wavelength channels due to the higher inter-channel crosstalk levels, and consequently (ii) increase the network power consumption because of the need of more signal regeneration. This paper aims at assessing the trade-off between spectral efficiency and the power consumption in a WDM transport network, when a certain quality of transmission needs to be guaranteed at the receiving node. This is accomplished by evaluating a number of spectral efficient MLR solutions, where the number of wavelength channels allocated to each sub-band is varied while keeping the required Bit Error Rate (BER) level at the receiving node fixed. Results show that the width of each sub-band plays a central role in determining the power consumption of an end-to-end connection.