Scaling Optical Fiber Networks - Challenges and Solutions

Virtually every phone call we make today, every text message we send, every movie we download, and every Internet-based application and service we use is at some point in their existence converted to photons that travel down a vast network of optical fibers. Over 2 billion kilometers of optical fibers have been deployed as of today, a string of glass that could be wrapped around the globe more than 50,000 times. Well over 100 million people enjoy fiber-optic connections directly to their homes today, and optical fibers connect the majority of cell towers, where the radio-frequency photons picked up from billions of mobile phone users are immediately converted to infrared photons for efficient fiber-optic backhaul into all-fiber metropolitan, regional, long-haul, and submarine networks that connect cities, span countries, and bridge continents.