| Abstract: | Direct communication of optical network units (ONUs) is an important function in metro‐access optical network. In this paper, a grid architecture supporting discretionary and efficient communication between ONUs is proposed. The grid architecture is built by using two interconnecting fibers to connect every two ONUs; this can give protection to every ONU by four ONUs. Additionally, the network reliability can be improved greatly. Grid topology of ONUs leads to their discretionary direct communication. In this topology, direct communication signal can be transmitted from one ONU to another ONU directly, rather than being returned to remote node central office. Also, the efficiency of direct communication can be improved remarkably with the proposed architecture. Finally, the performance analyses and the simulation results verify the feasibility of the proposed architecture. When the n reaches to 10, the reliability of downstream and direct communication signals is all larger than 99.993%. |
