Statistical study of crosstalk accumulation in WDM optical network with different topology

The robustness of optical networks with respect to the accumulation of homodyne crosstalk was statistically studied, with emphases on the effect of network topology, identified by the network scale and physical connectivity. The homodyne crosstalk, a major and irreparable signal quality degrading factor, are induced by non-ideal optical switches and demux/mux pairs at the optical cross-connect (OXC) in optical wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) networks. For the first time, our numerical simulations revealed that in a given network scale, there exists an optimum physical connectivity, at which the resultant overall accumulation of homodyne crosstalk can be minimized. We also took into account the practical network scale and the limit of the crosstalk ratio of the state-of-the-art optical switches and demultiplexers. It was shown that proper network design could greatly relax the requirements imposed on the optical switches and demultiplexers.