A new multicore fiber-optic monitoring system has the potential to enhance 5G. According to researchers at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M), in collaboration with the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia (UPV), such a system, which they have patented, could optimize energy consumption and preserve data transmission capacity.
The team’s work could lead to a parallel system, in which they will continually monitor the node’s energy needs. And in obtaining a single optical signal, “the system can also monitor temperature changes in the fiber core, energy distribution using optical means at different network points, and the state of the communication channel used within the fiber.”
“If lots of energy is sent, the temperature inside the fiber might increase and, therefore, could be damaged,” says Carmen Vázquez, a professor in the Department of Electronic Technology at UC3M. “This system helps us know how much energy we are sending and make sure that the infrastructure we are using to send that energy is in good condition and we are not damaging it.”
The research team’s work has found the system could be integrated in communication channels themselves with minimal insertion loss, in addition to monitoring on a different control channel than the channel used to send energy.
The UC3M and UPV team worked with the ITEAM-UPV’s Photonics Research Labs, which aided the study and manufacturing of some of its components.
“Fiber-manufactured devices monitor the power reaching the nodes in real time, while indicating the temperature [and] without affecting the power of the data being transmitted,” says Salvador Sales, professor and researcher at the ITEAM-UPV. “This is the basis for the technique developed by the UC3M [and UPV] group.”
The researchers note that this system is the first of its kind. Reference: F. M. A. Al-Zubaidi, J. D. López Cardona, D. S. Montero, and C. Vázquez, J. Light. Technol., 39, 13 (Jul. 1, 2021); doi:10.1109/jlt.2021.3074193.
