Lucent Technologies – the soon-to-be-spun-off equipment arm of AT&T Corp -has announced the Broadband Transport Network (BTN), a new combination of technologies which is said to eliminate the need for numerous optical fibers and regenerators, or single- channel optical fiber amplifiers, in next-generation high- capacity networks. The BTN was developed at Bell Laboratories, and incorporates three elements: TrueWave Single-Mode Optical Fiber; Optical Line System terminal equipment and optical amplifiers; and Synchronous Optical Network (SONET) and Synchronous Digital Hierarchy (SDH) transport terminals. The TrueWave fiber is said to be the first to be specifically designed to carry optical signals at multiple wavelengths using optical amplification since it carries these signals with less distortion – allowing it, says Lucent, to carry many more wavelengths simultaneously than with conventional dispersion- shifted fiber. As well as greater capacity, the technique is also said to allowing the signals to travel greater distances before regeneration is required. Lucent is making bold claims for the benefits of TrueWave, saying that network capacity can be increased from 2.5Gbps to 20Gbps. The Optical Line System terminal equipment, says Lucent, allows up to eight wavelengths to be multiplexed onto a single TrueWave fiber. When these are then amplified, says Lucent, the number of optical amplifiers or regenerators can be decreased by a factor of eight at each regenerator site. BTN will be pitched at long-distance telecoms providers, but Lucent says also that local providers are potential customers for scenarios where portions of their network require repeatered systems, or where the use of multiple wavelengths offer customer advantages (for example where a customer wants a dedicated wavelength for security purposes). The TrueWave fiber is available now, and the complete BTN solution will be available in Q2.
