Scalability of Optical Interconnects Based on Microring Resonators

Abstract

This paper investigates the use of optical microring resonators as switching elements in large optical interconnection fabrics. We introduce a simple physical-layer model to assess scalability in crossbar-and Benes-based architectures. We also propose a new dilated switching element that improves scalability to build fabrics of several Tbps of aggregate capacity.

Microring-Based Wavelength Routing Matrix

“…Furthermore, the use of smaller bitrates leads to a slightly larger scalability, due to the larger granularity in the use of the spectrum. Table 1(b) shows the final TTx tuning range w in THz needed to support the aggregated capacities reported in Table 1(a), when a maximum ACC X = 50 is allowed [4]. Dashes are placed where the resulting w was higher than 60 THz, a value today unreachable by TTxs.…”

“…Indeed, in [4] we showed that a 50 × 50 MRR-based crossbar is feasible using a single optical channel (X = 50). Furthermore, the above proposed ACC reducing strategies, can enhance the physical scalability.…”

“…Due to space limitations, we do not present a detailed physical-layer analysis, but the methodology presented in [4] can be easily exploited. The results presented in [4] showed that the scalability of MRR-based fabrics is mainly limited by the ACC. Thus, X provides a good insight on the scalability of the presented WRM.…”

Scalability of silicon photonic microring based switch

“…Prior studies have been conducted to estimate the maximal scalability of ring based switches, considering different cascading architectures [8,9]. However, to the best of our knowledge, analyses conducted so far model the deleterious effects of the switches based on extrapolations from lab-measurements of single devices.…”

Bias-free, low power and optically driven membrane InP switch on SOI for remotely configurable photonic packet switches

“…Both pure all-optical and hybrid electro-optic solutions have been investigated [2] [3]. On the hybrid front, various switch architectures have been investigated which either use electrically driven phase shifters [4], semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs) [5] or microring resonators [6]. Effort has also been put into building all-optical systems.…”