Study of access methods in high-speed photonic LANs (Para-Wave NET)

This paper describes a study of access methods in a previously proposed Para-Wave NET, which is a kind of photonic local area networks (LANs) and is intended to realize high-speed LANs. We compare two access methods, a scheduling method (S-method) and a non-scheduling method (NS-method). A use of a scheduler is assumed for the S-method. A pure-ALOHA is assumed for the NSmethod in this paper. Packets are generated according to a Poisson distribution and are processed according to an exponential distribution (an M/M system) for simplicity. We assume that complicated networks discussed in this paper can be approximately treated by concatenated independent M/M systems. We also assume a limited use of optical technologies, such as an optical transceiver and an optical cable. Packets are processed electrically, not optically. We can show a suitable packet generation rate region for each method by comparing the two methods. We discuss and show a benefit of using wavelengths in photonic LANs.