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<title>MultiGbit/s optical LAN utilizing a passive WDM star: toward an experimental prototype</title>

1993; SPIE; Volume: 2024; Linguagem: Inglês

10.1117/12.161321

1996-756X

Charles Barry, M. Hickey, Ciro A. Noronha, Nina L. Taranenko, L.G. Kazovsky,

Advanced Photonic Communication Systems

STARNET is an optical broadband local area network based on a physical passive star topology intended for backbone applications. Over a single physical network, STARNET offers all users both a moderate-speed packet switched subnetwork and a reconfigurable high- speed (up to 2.5 Gbps) Wavelength Division Multiplexed (WDM) circuit switched subnetwork. Based on these two data transport facilities, several topological and protocol solutions are available to the users. As a result, STARNET supports traffic of widely different speed and continuity characteristics. This paper describes an ongoing experimental effort aimed at the realization of a STARNET prototype network at the Optical Communication Research Laboratory of Stanford University. The prototype nodes are FDDI data rate and format compatible in the packet switched subnetwork and currently use 8B/10B encoded data at a rate of 1.25 Gbps in the circuit switched subnetwork. The STARNET network serves high performance workstations running distributed multimedia applications, including video- conferencing. In this paper, the electronic hardware which interfaces the workstation to the STARNET optics is described. The moderate-speed interface uses an off-the-shelf FDDI-on- copper module to interface to the STARNET optics; a custom high-speed interface module provides fast packet switching (electronic) over the circuit switched (wavelength) subnetwork.