Research on Optical Communications within the European IST program

The Information Society Technologies (IST) Programme is a research programme of the European Union, within the 5 framework (1998 – 2002). It is an integrated research programme, co-funded by the European Commission and the industry, focusing on the acceleration of the emergence of the Information Society in Europe. It is clear that the Information Society can not function unless the necessary infrastructure, based on optical networks, is put into place. Optical networking is therefore a priority area for RTD in the IST Programme. This paper will highlight a series of running IST projects, which focus on optical networks and network management. Seven of these projects are already running for more than a year, results already obtained within this projects will be highlighted. Five projects, which took off only recently, will be introduced to the reader. The paper will also describe a thematic network project OPTIMIST, which supports the cluster of optical networking projects and enhances inter-project collaboration on the theme of Optical Technologies across the whole IST Programme.