Abstract

Optical switches incorporating laser amplifiers are very attractive because the amplifier gain can be used to compensate for the switch insertion loss[1]. Using a twin-guide amplifier (TGA) with two closely spaced parallel semiconductor laser amplifiers, we reported the first demonstration of optical crosspoint switching with gain[2]. We report here measurements on a TGA which also has curved active guides, enabling the device to be connected to three optical fibres simultaneously and used as 1×2 optical switch.

© 1990 Optical Society of America