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:
Sep. 20, 2011
Filed:
Dec. 20, 2007
Richard A. Jensen, Lexington, MA (US);
Richard A. Jensen, Lexington, MA (US);
Polatis Photonics, Inc., Andover, MA (US);
Abstract
Current network switching architectures require communication with a higher level network control plane, which can be slow to reroute communications, resulting in unacceptable losses of communications for customers. Examples embodiments of the present invention reroute communications faster detecting optical power of an optical signal at optical switches coupled via optical communication paths, and causing at least one optical communication path between a first optical switch and second optical switch to switch to an alternative optical communication path, in part, through physical layer triggering in an event optical power at at least one of the first or second optical switches falls below a threshold level. Switching in response to physical layer triggering may result in reduced switching times and, consequently, faster restoration of communications to customers after a network fault interruption.