Network planning and design

Optical fiber

Computer security

Upgrade

Operating system

Optical Transport Network

Telecommunications

Computer science

Wavelength

Distributed computing

Computer network

Physics

Multiplexing

Optical add-drop multiplexer

Optics

Optical performance monitoring

Passive optical network

Artificial intelligence

Heuristic

Transmission (telecommunications)

Backbone network

Wavelength-division multiplexing

Multiplexer

Key (lock)

IEEE Communications Magazine

This article identifies the unavoidably required upgrade of short-term realizable elastic optical networks (EONs) operating over single-mode fibers toward spectrally-spatially flexible optical networks (SS-FONs), exploiting spatial division multiplexing (SDM) technology in order to cope with the expected mid- and long-term future traffic forecasts. Since a complete EON to SS-FON network migration overnight is unrealistic, this article proposes a gradual greenfield migration strategy employing novel heuristic planning solutions. These solutions allow identifying which network components should be SDM-capable so as to support the forecasted traffic increase at a given time. To allow transmission in an SS-FON, links should be extended with SDM-capable fibers and nodes should be equipped with SDM-capable reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexers. Using the proposed solutions, a migration case study in a national reference core network is provided and analyzed.

Greenfield Gradual Migration Planning toward Spectrally-Spatially Flexible Optical Networks