Ryo TAKAHASHI, Tatsushi NAKAHARA, Hirokazu TAKENOUCHI, Takako YASUI and Hiroyuki SUZUKI

NTT Photonics Laboratories, NTT Corporation, 3-1 Morinosato Wakamiya, Atsugi, Kanagawa, 243-0198, Japan

(Received November 18, 2003; Accepted January 9, 2004)

A novel scheme for all-optical serial-to-parallel conversion (SPC) is proposed for label recognition of ultrafast asynchronous burst optical packets. Compact SP converter modules were developed using a fiber array or a surface-emitting planar lightwave circuit, and 1-Tbit/s and 40-Gbit/s SPC for 16-bit optical packets is demonstrated using the modules. The key device in the converter is a spin-polarized surface-reflection all-optical switch (LOTOS) with an ultrafast switching time (250 fs) and an extremely high on/off ratio (>30 dB). Label recognition of 40-Gbit/s 16-bit burst-mode optical packets is experimentally confirmed using an optical clock-pulse generator and a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) electronics circuit as well as the all-optical SP converter. 1× 4 self-routing is also demonstrated using 2-channel control signals generated from the CMOS circuit according to a routing table.

Key words: all-optical switch, serial-to-parallel conversion, self-routing, label recognition, packet switching