OPTICAL RING METRO NETWORKS WITH FLEXIBLE GRID AND DISTANCE-ADAPTIVE OPTICAL COHERENT TRANSCEIVERS

This paper discusses and analyzes an optical metro ring network architecture with distance-adaptive coherent transceivers and formalizes the Routing, Modulation Level, and Spectrum Assignment (RMLSA) optimization problem over such network, in order to evaluate the possible benefits introduced by the usage of coherent technologies and of a spectrum grid of finer granularity in metro scenarios. Comparisons with legacy WDM systems show significant savings in terms of spectrum occupation and transceiver utilization.