Chairholder Profile

David Plant

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
McGill University

Chair Title

NSERC/Bell Industrial Research Chair in Ultra-High Bit Rate Optical Transport and Access Networks

Chair Program

Industrial Research Chairs Program

Role

Senior Chairholder since 2007

Summary

The objectives of this chair are to research systems level and technology level themes required to support Bell Canada's next generations of ultra-high bit rate optical transport and optical access networks. The resulting architectures, management schemes, protection and restoration strategies, and enabling technologies developed will be of immediate use to Bell by contributing to increases in the throughput, efficiency, and security of its fibre optic networks. Furthermore, through these improvements to Bell Canada's optic network, the research results will benefit other Canadian-based Internet companies whilst motivating equipment manufactures to realize new enabling optical and optoelectronic technologies. The special expertise available at Bell Canada in these areas will be exceedingly valuable to McGill researchers, providing them with precious and timely information regarding planned roll-out of services and technologies. Finally, the proposed program will create and maintain a rich technical environment for McGill trainees and Bell Canada technical personnel.

Having experienced constant growth for numerous decades, data rates on fibre optic networks are now poised to increase dramatically. Specifically, 40 gigabit/second (Gb/s) deployments are in progress on select Bell Canada and other carrier routes. Furthermore, 100 Gigabit Ethernet (100GE) has been demonstrated in the laboratory and will become a viable platform in the future. Beyond 100GE, projections suggest 500 GE is possible. In parallel, the service provider community worldwide is now aggressively deploying Fibre-to-the-Home/Premises (FTTH/P). It is no longer a question of if FTTH/P is necessary to meet burgeoning residential and corporate user demands, it's a question of when. Working with our industrial sponsor, Bell Canada, we have developed a research proposal based on two synergistic research themes: Ultra-High Bit Rate Optical Transport Networks and Passive Optical Networks (PONs). The PONs that support FTTH/P are projected to operate at multi-Gb/s rates in the near term (e.g., 1.25 and 2.5), and at 10+ Gb/s in the long term.

Partner

• Bell Canada

Contact Information

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
McGill University
Room 644, McConnell Engineeering Building
3480 University Street
Montreal, Québec
H3A 2A7

Tel.: 514-398-2989
Fax: 514-398-3127
E-mail: david.plant@mcgill.ca

Web site:
 http://www.photonics.ece.mcgill.ca/Plant/Plant.html