OPTICAL COMPUTING.

Abstract

In principle, optical fibers can carry signals with bandwidth in excess of one terahertz over a 1km distance. In practice, however, the bandwidth of fiber optic communication systems is much less than this because of the bandwidth restrictions of optoelectronic interfaces and electronics for signal processing. This is evident in three related types of fiber optic communication systems: a simple point-to-point fiber optic link, a fiber optic network and a photonic switch. In each case, an electronic or optoelectronic bottleneck exists that is unrelated to the fiber's transmission capability.