Fiber-Optic Chip Increases Speed, Cuts Energy Costs

The Photonic Service Engine (PSE), a new chip for fiber-optic networks that Alcatel-Lucent says offers double the capacity and four times the speed, will make its debut this week in Booth 738 at the OFC/NFOEC Conference in Los Angeles.
 
Based on Bell Labs’ engineering, the Alcatel-Lucent PSE supports 400 gigabit per second (400G) data transmission speeds on optical networks. It was designed specifically for use in a family of line cards in the Alcatel-Lucent 1830 Photonic Service Switch (PSS), and it reportedly enables more than 23 Terabits of traffic to be transmitted along a single optical fiber, increasing performance by more than 50 percent while reducing power consumed per gigabit by a third.

Recently, the technology behind the chip was tested when Deutsche Telecom’s Innovation Laboratories  and Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs broke a transmission distance record on optical networks, “doubling transmission capacity by employing the same process that sits at the heart of the Alcatel-Lucent PSE,” the company adds.