Patent ID: 8131152

Claim:
An optical add/drop multiplexer comprising: a first optical coupler receiving an optical signal including a plurality of multiplexed wavelengths and outputting the received optical signal; a wavelength blocker receiving the outputted optical signal from the first optical coupler, blocking at least one wavelength of the plurality of multiplexed wavelengths, and outputting a signal including the plurality of multiplexed wavelengths without the at least one blocked wavelength; a first wavelength selective switch, having one input port receiving the outputted optical signal from the first optical coupler and a plurality of output ports, demultiplexing a plurality of arbitrarily selected multiplexed wavelengths from the received optical signal, and outputting a different selected demultiplexed wavelength to each output; a second wavelength selective switch, having a plurality of input ports, each input port receiving a different optical signal and one output port, multiplexing a plurality of arbitrarily selected wavelength signals on the plurality of input ports and outputting a multiplexed wavelength signal; a second optical coupler receiving the optical signal output from the wavelength blocker and multiplexed wavelength signal from the second wavelength selective switch; an optical demultiplexer coupled to at least one output port of the first wavelength selective switch; and an optical multiplexer coupled to at least one input port of the second wavelength selective switch.