Progress in femtosecond technology for ultrafast communication networks

Summary form only given. An overview of the recent progress of ultrafast all-optical devices being developed for the application to optical time-division multiplexing (OTDM) communication and signal processing systems is given. In parallel with active on-going development of wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) systems, OTDM is another indispensable technique to support the rapidly increasing demand of system throughput. We review recent development of femtosecond all-optical devices such as semiconductor laser light sources, pulse compression devices, and all-optical switches.