Most transmission systems are based on optical fibers, carrying the traffic at a relatively low energy per bit. However, due to the lack of mature optical buffers, packet switching is still performed electrically. The required Optical-Electrical-Optical (O-E-O) conversions make the switching one of the areas with the fastest-growing energy consumption. A major challenge that must be met in designing future optical networks is curbing their energy consumption. Therefore, we investigate a hybrid optoelectronic switch which consists of an optical switching matrix supplemented with a shared electronic buffer. Performance analysis taking into account different classes of service, packet classifications and switch connectivity methods, shows that the hybrid switch satisfies the requirements of all the different classes of service in terms of Packet Loss Rate and latency, while it could significantly reduce the energy consumption compared to on-the-shelf all-electrical switches, since O‑E‑O conversions occur only for buffered packets.

Speaker(s): Wiem Samoud,

Location:
Room: MC603
Bldg: McConnell Engineering (McGill University)
3480 University Street
Montreal, Quebec
H3A0E9