All-Optical Packet-Switching Decoder Design and Demonstration at 10 Gb/s

A 3 $\times$ 8 all-optical decoder based on cross- polarization modulation in semiconductor optical amplifiers is demonstrated for the first time to our knowledge. The design requires a single active optical device per output. Experimental results are shown for return-to-zero modulated 10-Gb/s signals. Applications include label processing in optical packet switched optical networks.