Patent ID: 6292597
Filing Date: 2001-09-18
Classification: G02B,G02F,H04Q

Abstract:
An optical switch comprising:an integrated optical N.times.N Mach-Zehnder interferometer, N being greater than 2, the integrated optical Mach-Zehnder interferometer comprising a first N.times.N multimode interference coupler having N first ports and N second waveguides, and a second N.times.N multimode interference coupler having N first waveguides and N second ports, wherein N second waveguides of the first N.times.N multimode interference coupler are optically coupled with N first waveguides of the second N.times.N multimode interference coupler thereby forming N waveguide arms;optical path length changers for changing an optical path length of at least 2 of the N waveguide arms; anda P.times.P optical switch having P second ports and P first ports, P being at least 2 and less than N, at least 2 of the P second ports optically coupled to at least 2 of the N first ports.