A new architecture of optical cell compressor and expander for WDM/TDM switching systems

The optical cell compression and expansion is a key technology for the photonic TDM or WDM/TDM hybrid switching systems, which are indispensable due to their advantages of high capacity and high speed in switching operation and close compatibility with optical broadband networks. We propose in this paper a new architecture of optical cell compressor and expander. The proposed scheme of cell compressor requires the minimized number of components and has highly reduced ASE noise over previous schemes. The cell expander employs a nonlinear optical loop mirror which operates optically, resulting in ultra-high speed cell expansion.