Patent ID: 6941034

Claim:
An optical switch, which appropriately optically connects optical fibers on an input side with optical fibers on an output side, comprising: an array unit on the input side; and an array unit on the output side, the array unit on the input side having: an input side fiber array having signal input optical fibers aligned in a matrix with m rows and n columns (m and n are both natural numbers), at least one of the signal input optical fibers also serving as an adjustment optical fiber; a mirror array having tilt variable mirrors to deflect signal light beams from the signal input optical fibers and at east one fixed mirror to reflect an adjustment light beam from the adjustment optical fiber, tilt variable mirrors being aligned in the matrix with m rows and n columns, and the fixed mirror being off the matrix within rows and n columns; a direction adjustment mechanism to adjust a relative direction of the mirror array with respect to the input side fiber array; and positional adjustment mechanism to adjust a relative position of the input side fiber array and the mirror array in a direction crossing an optical axis of the input side fiber array, such that the signal input optical fiber serving as the adjustment optical fiber being positioned so as to face the fixed mirror by the positional adjustment mechanism, the direction of the mirror array is adjusted by the direction adjustment mechanism, and then the signal input optical fibers are positioned so as to respectively face the tilt variable mirrors by the positional adjustment mechanism, the array unit on the output side having an output side fiber array having signal output optical fibers.