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Researchers Pitch Optical Traffic Control

March 08, 2013 |
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Services like Google Maps use algorithms to determine the fastest route from point A to point B—even factoring in real-time traffic information as you travel to redirect you if, for example, a parade is blocking part of your route. Now, a team of researchers from Spain and Japan have achieved this kind of traffic control for the connections in optical networks by using a new dynamic network management system—and it does Google Maps one better. If necessary, the flexible-grid system can also redirect the traffic-congesting parade to another street (by re-arranging one or more existing connections), so you (a single new connection) wouldn’t have to go out of your way to avoid gridlock.

Ramon Casellas, a research associate at the Catalonia Technological Center of Telecommunications (CTTC) near Barcelona, will describe the system developed by his team and colleagues at KDDI R&D Labs in Japan at the Optical Fiber Communication Conference and Exposition/National Fiber Optic Engineers Conference (OFC/NFOEC) March 17-21 in Anaheim, Calif. The research represents one of many OFC/NFOEC talks on future network capabilities made possible by Software-Defined Networking, a popular topic at this year’s event.

This particular system design combines two elements: an OpenFlow controller and a so-called “stateful” path computation element (PCE). An OpenFlow controller uses a protocol that allows the behavior of a network device—regardless of its manufacturer—to be remotely configured and, Casellas says, “by extension, provides a way to operate a network using a logically centralized element that can see the network as a whole.” This enables packets of data to navigate the path of switches on a network much more efficiently than with traditional routing protocols, as if there were multiple, but coordinated remote traffic controllers helping to guide the network.

OFC/NFOEC



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