Route Selection Based on Impairments Computation in All-Optical CDMA-WDM Networks

Abstract

Link and switch impairments such as attenuation, dispersion, four-wave mixing, nonlinearities, etc. affect the optical signal quality (Q) or the optical signal to noise ratio (OSNR) in all-optical networks. The impairments not only degrade the performance of the individual links within the network, but also produce challenges for the routing procedure. It is not practical to fully integrate all photonic-specific attributes in the route selection process. In turn, new routing parameters and constraints must be defined that reflect the distinct characteristics of photonic networking. These constraints are applied to the design phase of all optical networks. Thus, these constraints are expressed as a cost (or metric form) that will be used in the network routing algorithm.

Keywords: Routing in all-optical switching, OCDMA-WDM, fiber metrics, switch metrics