International Business Machines Corporation

Vahe A Minassian

Matteo Cocchini

Michael Cracraft

Faezeh Gholami

Gerald H Miracle

Peter L Potvin

Richard A Neuner

A device, a method, and an article of manufacture are disclosed. The device includes a first optical fiber, a second optical fiber, an electrochromic component positioned between tips of the optical fibers, and a voltage source connected to the electrochromic component. The method includes providing an electrochromic component, providing optical fibers and a voltage source, and assembling an optical switch that includes the electrochromic component, the optical fibers, and the voltage source. The voltage source is connected to the electrochromic component. The article of manufacture includes an optical switch with a voltage source connected to an electrochromic component positioned between optical fiber tips.

Electrochromic optical switch

A fiber-optic switching system is provided which includes an optical fiber switch having first and second optical fiber portions and an electrically-controlled actuator. The first and second optical fiber portions are spaced apart with a gap between the portions that is sized to allow for light signal coupling between the optical fiber portions in a signal-passing state of the switch. The electrically-controlled actuator is coupled to transition the switch between the signal-passing state, where the light signal is allowed to pass between the optical fiber portions, and a signal-non-passing state, where the light signal is prevented from passing between the optical fiber portions. The electrically-controlled actuator includes an electroactive material exhibiting a physical change with change in an applied electrical field, where the physical change facilitates transitioning the optical fiber switch between the signal-passing and the signal-non-passing states.

Electrically-controlled fiber-optic switching system

An asynchronous high-speed data interface for coupling a serial channel to a parallel control unit. A first state machine, running synchronously with the channel transmitter clock, controls the filling of a pair of dual-port input buffers in alternating fashion with frame contents bytes from incoming serial frames that have been deserialized and decoded. A second state machine, running synchronously with a second clock that is asynchronous with the channel transmitter clock, controls the transfer of the frame contents bytes from the selected input buffer to one of a pair of output buffers en route to the control unit. Upon detecting the receipt of the third incoming frame contents byte, the first state machine sets a start latch, causing the second state machine to begin transferring data from the selected input buffer to the selected output buffer while the input buffer is still being filled. Means are provided for disregarding the frame contents bytes that have been transferred to the selected output buffer if the frame is ultimately aborted.

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Woodstock, NY, United States of America

Vahe A Minassian