System and method for communicating optical signals between a data service provider and subscribers

• US 6,973,271 B2
• Filed: 07/05/2001
• Issued: 12/06/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 10/04/2000
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: ARRIS Solutions, Inc. (CommScope Holding Company, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Wave7 Optics, Inc. (Enablence Technologies Incorporated)
• Inventors: Quinn, Patrick W., Farmer, James O., Kenny, John J., Vella, Emmanuel A., Tighe, Thomas A., Whittlesey, Paul F.
• Primary Examiner(s): Chan, Jason
• Assistant Examiner(s): Bello, Agustin
• Application Number:
  US09/899,410
• Publication Number:
  US 20020039218A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,615 Days
• Field of Search: 359/125, 359/137, 359/167, 359/127
• US Class Current: 398/68
• CPC Class Codes: H04J 14/0226 Fixed carrier allocation, e.g. according to service
• CPC Class Codes: H04J 14/0232 for downstream transmission
• CPC Class Codes: H04J 14/0238 Wavelength allocation for communications one-to-many, e.g. multicasting wavelengths
• CPC Class Codes: H04J 14/0247 Sharing one wavelength for at least a group of ONUs
• CPC Class Codes: H04J 14/0252 Sharing one wavelength for at least a group of ONUs, e.g. for transmissions from-ONU-to-OLT or from-ONU-to-ONU
• CPC Class Codes: H04J 14/028 WDM bus architectures
• CPC Class Codes: H04J 14/0282 WDM tree architectures
• CPC Class Codes: H04J 14/0286 WDM hierarchical architectures
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/22 Adaptations for optical transmission
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 11/0067 Provisions for optical access or distribution networks, e.g. Gigabit Ethernet Passive Optical Network (GE-PON), ATM-based Passive Optical Network (A-PON), PON-Ring
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 11/0071 Provisions for the electrical-optical layer interface

Abstract

An optical fiber network can include an outdoor laser transceiver node that can be positioned in close proximity to the subscribers of an optical fiber network. The outdoor laser transceiver node does not require active cooling and heating devices that control the temperature surrounding the laser transceiver node. The laser transceiver node can adjust a subscriber'"'"'s bandwidth on a subscription basis or on an as-needed basis. The laser transceiver node can also offer data bandwidth to the subscriber in preassigned increments. Additionally, the laser transceiver node lends itself to efficient upgrading that can be performed entirely on the network side. The laser transceiver node can also provide high speed symmetrical data transmission. Further, the laser transceiver node can utilize off-the-shelf hardware to generate optical signals such as Fabry-Perot (F-P) laser transmitters, distributed feed back lasers (DFB), or vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSELs).

Claims

1. An optical network system comprising:

a data service hub for sending downstream optical data signals on a first optical waveguide, and for sending downstream optical RF modulated television broadcast signals on a second optical waveguide;

a plurality of optical taps, each optical tap dividing downstream optical signals comprising a combination of the downstream optical data signals and the optical RF modulated television broadcast signals between a plurality of optical waveguides coupled to a plurality of subscriber optical interfaces;

each subscriber optical interface providing electrical communications to a subscriber, each subscriber optical interface coupled to a respective optical tap by an optical waveguide, for receiving the downstream optical signals from a respective optical tap and converting the downstream optical signals into downstream electrical signals; and

a laser transceiver node disposed between the data service hub and the optical tap, for communicating optical signals to and from the data service hub and to and from a respective optical tap, for apportioning bandwidth that is shared between groups of subscriber optical interfaces connected to a respective optical tap, the laser transceiver node further comprising;

a plurality of multiplexers for providing downstream modulation signals to respective optical transmitters and for receiving upstream electrical signals from respective optical receivers, each multiplexer corresponding to a respective optical tap;

a plurality of bi-directional splitters for receiving downstream and upstream optical signals, each bi-directional splitter coupled to a respective optical transmitter and a respective optical receiver;

an optical transceiver coupled to the first optical waveguide for converting downstream optical data signals from the first optical waveguide into downstream electrical data signals, for converting upstream electrical data signals into optical data signals;

a routing device coupled to each multiplexer and the optical transceiver, for assigning downstream electrical data signals received from the optical transceiver to predetermined multiplexers, for combining upstream electrical data signals from respective multiplexers into one electrical signal that modulates the optical transceiver; and

an optical splitter coupled to the second optical waveguide and respective optical diplexers, the diplexers for combining the downstream optical RF modulated television broadcast signals from the second optical waveguide with downstream optical data signals.

2. The optical network system of claim 1, wherein the optical receivers convert upstream optical data signals from a respective optical tap into upstream electrical data signals.

3. The optical network system of claim 1, wherein to optical transmitters convert downstream electrical data signals from a respective multiplexer into downstream optical data signals.

4. The optical network system of claim 1, wherein each subscriber optical interface receives upstream electrical data signals from a subscriber and converts the upstream electrical data signals into upstream optical data signals and sends the upstream optical data signals over an optical waveguide towards a corresponding optical tap.

5. The optical network system of claim 1, wherein each optical tap combines upstream optical data signals received from a plurality of optical waveguides and propagates the combined upstream optical data signals over a single optical waveguide.

6. The optical network system of claim 1, wherein the laser transceiver node accepts gigabit Ethernet optical signals from the data service hub and partitions the Ethernet optical signals into a predetermined number of groups.

7. The optical network system of claim 1, wherein each optical transmitter comprises one of a Fabry Perot laser, a distributed feedback laser, and a vertical cavity surface emitting laser (VCSEL).

8. The optical network system of claim 1, wherein the optical tap routing device manages upstream and downstream data protocols.

9. The optical network system of claim 8, wherein one of the protocols comprises a time division multiple access protocol.

10. The optical network system of claim 1, wherein data bit rates for the upstream and downstream optical signals are substantially symmetrical.