A high performance optical bus for digital avionics systems

The author surveys several of the candidate architectures suitable for embedded high-performance photonic networks and examines advanced architectural concepts made viable for avionics applications by emerging photonics technology. An example of an optical local area network (OLAN) capable of supporting end-to-end very-high-speed communication, on the order of gigabits per second, is presented. The advantages of the OLAN include: the capability of having several logical networks, each having different data rate characteristics while sharing the same physical medium; enhanced flexibility and affordable attachment costs which are matched to the service needs of the station; inexpensive, incremental, timely, and nonintrusive network upgrades without global impact on the network; and high reliability due to the passive nature of the station attachment.<>