Optical power control in GMPLS control plane

The exponential traffic growth in optical networks has triggered the evolution from fixed-grid to flex-grid technology. This evolution allows better spectral efficiency and spectrum usage over current optical networks in order to facilitate huge dynamic traffic demands. The promise of flex-grid technology in terms of increasing the number of optical channels established over optical links, however, may not be sustainable because of the associated increase in optical amplification power. In this work, we detail a power control process that takes advantage of link optical power and channel optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) margins to allow network operators to support this optical power increase while maintaining the use of legacy optical amplifiers. New generalized multiprotocol label switching (GMPLS) protocol extensions are proposed on which to integrate the optical power control process in the control plane. The performance of the process is evaluated in terms of the blocking ratio and network throughput over fixed-grid and flex-grid networks. Results show that controlling optical power benefits from the flex-grid technology in terms of spectrum and capacity gain and reduces optical connection blocking.