All-optical address extraction for optical routing

This paper describes the optical circuit that enables to extract address from a transmitted cell in an all-optical manner. Nonlinear optical loop mirrors (NOLM's) are used as all-optical switches in order to confirm the operation of the proposed circuit. The control pulses synchronized with address bits are generated from the transmitted cell. The address bits are successfully extracted without any electronic control circuit. The factors that limit an attainable bit rate are discussed. If we use NOLM composed of a 2-km-long fiber, 110 Gb/s is attainable for the 4 ps FWHM input pulse with RZ format.