The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 19, 2002
Filed:
Dec. 08, 2000
Leon Li-Feng Jiang, Princeton Jct, NJ (US);
Raul B. Montalvo, North Potomac, MD (US);
John Lynn Shanton, III, Middletown, MD (US);
Wenli Yu, Gaithersburg, MD (US);
Seneca Networks, Rockville, MD (US);
Abstract
The present invention relates to a bidirectional optical network including a bridge for selectively transferring information from an optical channel carried on a first bidirectional WDM optical waveguide to at least two optical channels on a second bidirectional WDM optical waveguide. The first and second bidirectional optical waveguides each carry two counter-propagating WDM optical signals each having plural channels. A bridge is interposed between the first and second bidirectional optical waveguides which includes an optical add-drop multiplexer optically communicating with each bidirectional waveguide. At least one optical channel having first and second data bits streams is dropped from the first bidirectional waveguide. The first and second data bit streams are respectively encoded on two different optical channels which are then added to the second bidirectional optical waveguide. Advantageously, the two optical channels encoded with the two series of data bits may travel in the same or opposite directions when added to the second bidirectional waveguide, further enhancing network flexibility.