Patent ID: 7002734

Claim:
A WDM optical transmission apparatus disposed at a node of a ring network or of an open ring network, comprising: a pre-amplifier having two control modes consisting of ALC mode in which the gain of an optical amplifier is controlled such that the total output of the optical amplifier is constant for a multiplexed wavelength number n, and of AGC mode which is a control mode maintaining constant the ratio of an optical input level to an optical output level for the multiplexed wavelength number n; and a post-amplifier having two control modes consisting of ASE mode in which the gain of the post-amplifier is set higher than that in the AGC mode and is set such that the output level of ASE light corresponds to the multiplexed wavelength number n, and of the AGC mode; wherein in the ASE mode, the gain of the pre-amplifier in the WDM optical transmission apparatus at the next node is set under an ALC control utilizing ASE light output from the post-amplifier.