Optical interconnects: topology and protocol issues

Optical interconnects for advanced computers have been postulated for the past two decades to obtain performance and reliability improvements over existing electrical interconnects. Optical interconnects have the potential for extremely high bandwidth, immunity to electromagnetic interference, elimination of radiated emissions, and lower costs. To date, this potential has yet to be realized. The ever increasing clock rates and interconnect complexity associated with emerging computer device technology as well as the increased emphasis on massively parallel processing may serve to hasten the implementation of optical interconnects into computer systems. This paper discusses some of the issues associated with the implementation of optical interconnects in advanced computer systems and presents the status of the U.S. Navy optical backplane interconnect system (OBIS) program.