Subchannel security at the optical layer

Abstract

The present invention includes various novel systems and methods for dynamically modifying WDM transmission and receive steps (individually or in combination), including encoding client signals, mapping them to subchannels within or across ITU channels, modulating them onto subcarrier frequencies, and multiplexing them together for optical transmission. By dynamically modifying one or more of these processing steps over time (as well as encrypting underlying client signals), additional security is provided at the physical (optical) layer of an optical network, thereby greatly enhancing overall network security. Tunable lasers are employed to generate respective subcarrier frequencies, which represent subchannels of an ITU channel to which client signals are mapped. Client circuits are divided and combined with one another before being mapped to individual subchannels within and across ITU channels, thereby facilitating desired optical routing, switching, concatenation and protection of the client circuits mapped to those subchannels across the nodes of a WDM network.

Description

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS[0001]This application is a continuation in part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14 / 063,955, filed Oct. 25, 2013, entitled “SUBCHANNEL SECURITY AT THE OPTICAL LAYER”, which is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13 / 031,594, filed Feb. 21, 2011, entitled “Subchannel Security at the Optical Layer”, which claims the benefit, pursuant to 35 U.S.C. §119(e), of (i) U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61 / 306,925, filed Feb. 22, 2010, entitled “Subchannel Security at the Optical Layer”, each of which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.BACKGROUND[0002]1. Field of Art[0003]The present invention relates generally to network optimization, and more particularly to non-disruptive optimization of SDN Flows across different data transfer technologies based on real-time monitoring of application-level metadata and infrastructure-level network metrics.[0004]2. Description of Related Art[0005]Software-defined networking (SD...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The present invention provides methods and architectures to address problems of network congestion and poor quality of service (QoS) in a network environment. A system environment monitor is used to collect real-time and historical network metrics, as well as application metadata, to analyze the performance of applications and network hardware components. This information is used to generate modified sets of single-domain network flows and implement them in real-time across a mixed technology network without disrupting existing flows or other real-time traffic. The system also predicts future network performance based on the historical performance of applications and network hardware, simulating changes to network flows to determine their impact on overall network performance or efficiency. The technical effects of this innovation include improved network performance and efficiency by optimizing network flows to minimize congestion and achieve desired QoS objectives.

Problems solved by technology

At a more conceptual level, purchasing a popular DVD on “Black Friday” at Amazon, for example, may take longer than on other days due to an unusually high number of concurrent users.

These “solutions,” however, fail to address certain significant realities of existing SDN networks.

One such reality is the fact that implementing revised SDN Flows often disrupts existing SDN Flows (to be modified), as well as other real-time network traffic.

Applications running on the network may, as a result of these attempted optimizations, experience downtime or errors that, in some cases, can be quite costly.

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