ABSTRACT
Optical technologies can be found at all network hierarchy levels of today’s network infrastructures, ranging from ber-to-the-home broadband access networks to high-speed backbone networks. In this chapter, we discuss recent progress on ber-optic communications and networks and review the most important optical switching techniques that help improve the bandwidth efciency and decrease the cost and power consumption of next-generation optical networks with subwavelength switching capabilities. Finally, we discuss remaining open issues and elaborate on future research challenges and opportunities.
