Scalable optical switch array based on semiconductor optical amplifier

Optical space switch arrays that can offer nanoseconds switch time as the devices are integrated to larger and larger arrays will meet the demand of high speed and agile routing of packets in future optical packet switching networks.Under the analysis of scalable limitations toward ordinary optical space switch matrix based on semiconductor optical amplifier,basic principles of novel arrays which can be easily scaled to significantly larger sizes are presented,as well as their progress.