Software defined networking (SDN) over space division multiplexing (SDM) optical networks: features, benefits and experimental demonstration.

We present results from the first demonstration of a fully integrated SDN-controlled bandwidth-flexible and programmable SDM optical network utilizing sliceable self-homodyne spatial superchannels to support dynamic bandwidth and QoT provisioning, infrastructure slicing and isolation. Results show that SDN is a suitable control plane solution for the high-capacity flexible SDM network. It is able to provision end-to-end bandwidth and QoT requests according to user requirements, considering the unique characteristics of the underlying SDM infrastructure.

Modulation formats for multi-core fiber transmission.

We investigate high dimensional modulation formats for multi-core fibers (MCFs) and spatial superchannels. We show that the low skew variations between MCF cores maybe exploited to generate 'multi-core' formats that offer significant advantages over independently transmitting conventional 4-dimensional formats in each core. We describe how pulse position modulation formats may be transposed to the spatial domain and then investigate a family of modulation formats referred to as core-coding, one of which has the same power and spectral efficiency as polarization switched quaternary phase shift keying but with half of the optical power, potentially improving non-linear tolerance for long distance transmission, albeit at the cost of implementation challenges. Finally, we investigate the application of set-partitioning to multi-core formats using a single-parity check bit transmitted in one quadrature of one polarization in one of the cores and polarization-division multiplexing quadrature phase shift keying data in all remaining cores. We observe that for high core counts, an advantage of almost 3 dB in asymptotic power efficiency may be obtained with negligible impact on spectral efficiency, which translates into experimentally measured reduction in the required optical signal-to-noise ratio of up to 1.8 dB at a bit-error-rate of 10-5 and the same data-rate, and additional transmission reach of up to 20%.

Fully-elastic multi-granular network with space/frequency/time switching using multi-core fibres and programmable optical nodes.

We present the first elastic, space division multiplexing, and multi-granular network based on two 7-core MCF links and four programmable optical nodes able to switch traffic utilising the space, frequency and time dimensions with over 6000-fold bandwidth granularity. Results show good end-to-end performance on all channels with power penalties between 0.75 dB and 3.7 dB.