A frequency-selective system that may be used as, or as part of, an add/drop multiplexer. An input signal is fed to a Mach-Zehnder interferometer configured to drop, or suppress, by destructive interference, a signal component in a first frequency band from among a plurality of frequency bands. One or more bandpass filters in one arm of the Mach-Zehnder interferometer suppress other frequencies, outside of the first frequency band, so that signals at these other frequencies are not suppressed by destructive interference and are present at the output of the Mach-Zehnder interferometer. A coupler connected after the output of the Mach-Zehnder interferometer adds, into the signal path, a replacement for the dropped signal.

A reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexer includes N input ports, N output ports, M add ports and M drop ports. Each of the N input ports and each of the M add ports is respectively connected to one first polarizer. Each of the N output ports and each of the M drop ports is respectively connected to one second polarizer. A first end of the first polarizer is connected to a second end of the first polarizer, forming a loop including the first polarizer. A first end of the second polarizer is connected to a second end of the second polarizer, forming a loop including the second polarizer. An annular waveguide array is between a loop L.sub.Ii and a loop L.sub.Oj. A first polarizer included in the loop L.sub.Ii is connected to an i.sup.th input port. A second polarizer included in the loop L.sub.Oj is connected to a j.sup.th output port.

Systems and methods are implemented at an Optical Add/Drop Multiplexer (OADM) node using virtual sections to provide sectional control over an optical link over a foreign-controlled optical network. The systems and methods include obtaining and storing a first power spectral density snapshot of an optical link, from an optical spectrum monitor and when the optical link is in a non-fault condition; responsive to detection of a fault on channels traversing the optical link, obtaining a second power spectral density snapshot at a receiving end of the optical link; analyzing the first power spectral density snapshot and the second power spectral density snapshot; and determining the fault is on the optical link based on the analyzing.

A space-division multiplexed optical fiber includes a relatively high refractive index optical core region surrounded by alternating regions of relatively low and relative high refractive index material, forming concentric high index rings around the core. The optical core region supports propagation of light along at least a first radial mode associated with the optical core region and a high index ring region supports propagation of light along at least a second radial mode associated with the high index ring region. The second radial mode is different from the first radial mode.

An optical communications apparatus is configured to be connected to first, second, and third optical cables. In a branch connecting configuration, a branch optical path is enabled so that (i) signal wavelengths received over the first cable are routed to the third cable and (ii) signal wavelengths received over the third cable are routed to the second cable. The signal wavelengths received over the third cable include at least one of the signal wavelengths routed from the first cable to the third cable and returned via a loop connection at a distal portion of the third cable. In a bypass configuration, a connection via the branch optical path to the distal portion of the third cable is bypassed so that the signal wavelengths received over the first cable are routed to the second cable without first being routed through the distal portion of the third cable.

In order to improve the reliability of a reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexing (ROADM) device, provided is an optical add/drop device that comprises the following: a first wavelength selection unit and a second wavelength selection unit that can select and output an optical signal of a prescribed wavelength from among inputted optical signals; a first branching unit that selectively outputs a first signal being an optical signal that has been inputted from a first terminal station on a main route to the first wavelength selection unit and the second wavelength selection unit; a second branching unit that selectively outputs a second signal being an optical signal that has been inputted from a second terminal station on a sub-route to the first wavelength selection unit and the second wavelength selection unit; and a first output unit that can selectively output to the second terminal station, as a third signal, either the optical signal outputted by the first wavelength selection unit on the basis of the first signal and the second signal, or the optical signal outputted by the second wavelength selection unit on the basis of the first signal and the second signal.

An optical transmission device includes an optical amplifier that optically amplifies a wavelength multiplexing signal which is input, a wavelength selective switch that splits, inserts, or transmits an optical signal of any wavelength of the wavelength multiplexing signal, an optical channel power monitor that detects power of each channel of the wavelength multiplexing signal which is input and the wavelength multiplexing signal which is output, and a controller that calculates an amount of change in the optical signal of each channel in which a gain of each channel between an input and an output to and from the device is steady, and adjusts an amount of attenuation of the wavelength selective switch, based on the power of each channel of the wavelength multiplexing signal that is detected by the optical channel power monitor.

Implementations described and claimed herein provide systems and methods for a configurable optical peering fabric to dynamically create a connection between participant sites without any physical site limitations or necessity of specialized client and network provider equipment being located within such a facility. Client sites to a network may connect to a configurable switching element to be interconnected to other client sites in response to a request to connect the first client site with a second site, also connected to network, via the switching element. A request may trigger verification of the requested and, upon validation, transmission of an instruction to the switching element to enable the cross connect within the switching element. The first site and the second site may thus be interconnected via the switching element in response to the request, without the need to co-locate equipment or to manually install a jumper between client equipment.

A communication system includes three or more nodes, and a multi-core fiber having a plurality of cores, the multi-core fiber being used in at least a partial segment of a connection between the nodes, wherein each of nodes includes: a fault information transmitting device configured to transmit fault information indicating that a fault has occurred in a communication path between one node and another node of the nodes when it is detected that it is not possible to perform communication between the one node and the another node; and a fault location specifying device configured to specify a section between nodes in which a fault has occurred on the basis of the fault information received from the fault information transmitting device provided in each of the nodes.

Provided is a network node for a coherent optical wavelength division multiplex (WDM) transmission network including at least one remote port which is adapted to receive from and/or output to neighboring network nodes an optical WDM signal including one or more optical channel signals each lying within an optical channel of an optical WDM transmission band and a predetermined number N of local ports, each local port being adapted to receive from a dedicated coherent optical transmitter an optical add channel signal which is to be integrated in an optical WDM signal that is output at a remote port and/or each local port being adapted to output to a respective dedicated optical receiver an optical drop channel signal. The network node includes an optical router device that defines the at least one remote port and further defines an internal remote port, the optical router device being configured to route one or more selected or all optical channel signals included in the optical WDM signal received at a selected remote port as optical drop channel signals to the internal remote port and/or to route one or more optical add channel signals received at the internal remote port to one or more selected remote ports or to all remote ports. The network node further includes a passive optical filter device which is connected, at an internal remote port of the passive optical filter device, to the internal remote port of the optical router device, and which further defines the predetermined number N of local ports. The passive optical filter device is configured to define N optical bandpass filter functions each of which describes a bandpass filter characteristic between the internal remote port of the passive optical filter device and a selected, respectively differing local port. The passband of each optical bandpass filter function covers two or more neighboring optical channels. The passbands of all optical bandpass filter functions differ from each other with respect to the optical channels covered.