Channel Error Estimation in Next Generation Optical Networks

The next generation optical network demands unprecedented performance due to ultra-high aggregate bandwidth and the many channels transported by a single fiber. In dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) networks, optical channels travel for hundreds of kilometers and thus they suffer from attenuation, noise, jitter, dispersion and other degradations due to photon-matter interactions. Among the wellestablished link layer performance parameters that determine channel performance are bit error rate (BER), Qfactor, received signal power and signal to noise ratio (SNR). To date, BER and signal power are the only two parameters that are monitored in-service using error detected codes (EDC) and signal power meters, respectively. However, typical EDC codes have a limited error detection capability and require several information frames (or packets) to estimate BER and thus they are time consuming. In this paper we present a statistical estimation method, which in short intervals and in-service estimates BER, SNR, Q-factor and average power at each optical channel. Our method lends itself to VLSI implementation to estimate in realtime the aforementioned performance parameters so that proactive . Key-Words: Optical channel performance estimation, Optical Noise, BER