A MEMS-based Wavelength Selectable Switch (WSS), used classically for demultiplexing fiber optic communications, is re-purposed to act as a filter. A light emitter provides a light beam with its wavelength detected by a wavelength detector. A light condenser directs reflected light from the light emitter to an input of the WSS. The WSS is controllable to provide a selected wavelength band to a selected output of the WSS, where it is detected by a photodetector. Other wavelengths are discarded by the WSS at other outputs. A controller is configured to control the WSS to select the selected wavelength band based on a detected wavelength from the wavelength detector.

An optical assembly includes a light source for providing a beam of light, a lens system configured to expand and collimate the beam of light, and a configurable beam injector, wherein the beam injector contains a first grid plate and a second grid plate to block individual beams of light. The first grid plate and the second grid plate may be configured such that each grid plate respectively corresponds to particular MEMS mirrors. The grid plates can be configured to have pathways that allow for beams of light to be passed through and other pathways which are blocked to prevent the passage of light. The first grid plate and second grid plate may thus block or allow for transmission of beams of lights to those particular MEMS mirrors. The second grid plate can be configured to be easily swappable during or removable to allow for a different set of beams of light, corresponding to a different set of MEMS mirrors, to be blocked. The second grid plate can be configured to be rotated or slid linearly within a housing.

Data center interconnections, which encompass WSCs as well as traditional data centers, have become both a bottleneck and a cost/power issue for cloud computing providers, cloud service providers and the users of the cloud generally. Fiber optic technologies already play critical roles in data center operations and will increasingly in the future. The goal is to move data as fast as possible with the lowest latency with the lowest cost and the smallest space consumption on the server blade and throughout the network. Accordingly, it would be beneficial for new fiber optic interconnection architectures to address the traditional hierarchal time-division multiplexed (TDM) routing and interconnection and provide reduced latency, increased flexibility, lower cost, lower power consumption, and provide interconnections exploiting scalable optical modular optically switched interconnection network as well as temporospatial switching fabrics allowing switching speeds below the slowest switching element within the switching fabric.

Systems and methods are provided for flexible wavelength assignments in a communication network. An optical adapter is provided for the systems and methods. The optical adapter has a first interface connected to an optical switch via a first optical cable, a second interface connected to a plurality of server ports via a plurality of second optical cables, and a controller coupled to a switch controller of the optical switch. The controller is configured to perform: obtaining instructions from the switch controller; and assigning, based on the instructions, one or more wavelengths for a time slot to one of the server ports, wherein the controller performs the assigning without direct communication with the server ports.

Data center interconnections, which encompass WSCs as well as traditional data centers, have become both a bottleneck and a cost/power issue for cloud computing providers, cloud service providers and the users of the cloud generally. Fiber optic technologies already play critical roles in data center operations and will increasingly in the future. The goal is to move data as fast as possible with the lowest latency with the lowest cost and the smallest space consumption on the server blade and throughout the network. Accordingly, it would be beneficial for new fiber optic interconnection architectures to address the traditional hierarchal time-division multiplexed (TDM) routing and interconnection and provide reduced latency, increased flexibility, lower cost, lower power consumption, and provide interconnections exploiting scalable optical modular optically switched interconnection network as well as temporospatial switching fabrics allowing switching speeds below the slowest switching element within the switching fabric.

Systems and methods are provided for flexible wavelength assignments in a communication network. An optical adapter is provided for the systems and methods. The optical adapter has a first interface connected to an optical switch via a first optical cable, a second interface connected to a plurality of server ports via a plurality of second optical cables, and a controller coupled to a switch controller of the optical switch. The controller is configured to perform: obtaining instructions from the switch controller; and assigning, based on the instructions, one or more wavelengths for a time slot to one of the server ports, wherein the controller performs the assigning without direct communication with the server ports.

Various example embodiments for a wavelength selective switch including a direct grating interface are presented. In at least some example embodiments, a wavelength selective switch may include a light propagating element having a tilted fiber grating integrated therein, thereby providing a direct grating interface to the light propagating element. It is noted that use of such a direct grating interface may obviate the need for use of various components typically utilized within wavelength selective switches (e.g., front-end optics in the port direction, front-end optics and diffractive gratings in the wavelength direction, and so forth), thereby enabling the size of wavelength selective switches to be reduced or even for the wavelength selective switches to be made compact or even ultra-compact.

Data center interconnections, which encompass WSCs as well as traditional data centers, have become both a bottleneck and a cost/power issue for cloud computing providers, cloud service providers and the users of the cloud generally. Fiber optic technologies already play critical roles in data center operations and will increasingly in the future. The goal is to move data as fast as possible with the lowest latency with the lowest cost and the smallest space consumption on the server blade and throughout the network. Accordingly, it would be beneficial for new fiber optic interconnection architectures to address the traditional hierarchal time-division multiplexed (TDM) routing and interconnection and provide reduced latency, increased flexibility, lower cost, lower power consumption, and provide interconnections exploiting scalable optical modular optically switched interconnection network as well as temporospatial switching fabrics allowing switching speeds below the slowest switching element within the switching fabric.

Data center interconnections, which encompass WSCs as well as traditional data centers, have become both a bottleneck and a cost/power issue for cloud computing providers, cloud service providers and the users of the cloud generally. Fiber optic technologies already play critical roles in data center operations and will increasingly in the future. The goal is to move data as fast as possible with the lowest latency with the lowest cost and the smallest space consumption on the server blade and throughout the network. Accordingly, it would be beneficial for new fiber optic interconnection architectures to address the traditional hierarchal time-division multiplexed (TDM) routing and interconnection and provide reduced latency, increased flexibility, lower cost, lower power consumption, and provide interconnections exploiting N×M×D Gbps photonic interconnects wherein N channels are provided each carrying M wavelength division signals at D Gbps.

Embodiments are provided herein for efficient component communication and resource optimization in a disaggregated computing system. A general purpose link is provided between a plurality of devices in the disaggregated computing system. The general purpose link is used to connect the plurality of devices which respectively comprise different types of devices. A first data object is stored within one of the plurality of devices according to a past use or an expected use of the data object by at least a respective one of a set of processors within the disaggregated computing system, and the general purpose link is dynamically rewired according to a location of the first data object and a location of the at least one of the respective set of processors.