The Impact Of 10 Gb/s SONET (OC-192) On Gigabit Networks

The Synchronous Optical Network (SONET) provides a key enabling technology in the recent development of gigabit networks because of its flexibility and standardized interfaces. The majority of the gigabit testbeds deployed to-date employ SONET OC-48 transmission systems as their physical layer. With the rapid advances in optical and electronic technologies, it is anticipated that SONET OC-192 (9.953 Gb/s) will be commonly available by the end of the decade. OC-192 offers an attractive alternative to OC-48 (2.488 Gb/s) in the implementation of the proposed National Information Infrastructure. In this paper we examine the rationale for the introduction of the 10 Gb/s SONET and examine some of the potential impacts in the evolution of the gigabit networks.