1080 JOURNAL OF LIGHTWAVE TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 38, NO.

5, MARCH 1, 2020

Optimized Design and Challenges for C&L

Band Optical Line Systems
Victor Lopez , Benyuan Zhu , Daniela Moniz , Nelson Costa, Joao Pedro , Xian Xu, Ales Kumpera,
Lee Dardis, Jeff Rahn, and Steve Sanders

(Invited Paper)

Abstract—Optical communications are the key enabler for the

ever-increasing traffic growth as they allow multiplexing a number
of carriers onto a single optical fiber. However, network deploy-
ments are becoming more challenging due to the large bandwidth
increments. Indeed, the fiber planning process is a slow, costly, and
strategic activity for network operators, who must decide where to
rent or deploy additional capacity. Depending on the long-term
view, the network operator will define a fiber plan which may
require high capital expenditure (CAPEX) investments to deploy
additional multiple fiber pairs between central offices. During the
last few years, C&L-band technologies have evolved to a point
where they are now strong candidates to extend the fiber lifetime
of these high capacity links. This article aims to present the evo-
lution of C&L-band systems from a network design perspective,
covering transmission and optical amplifier capabilities, demand
optimization phase, showing a record demonstration of 56.4 Tb/s
C&L-band 800 km transmission using commercial C&L-band
system technology.
Index Terms—L-band, superchannels, optical performance,
interoperability, optical amplifier.
I. INTRODUCTION
NTERNET traffic is continuously growing for decades, and,
I currently, there are forecasts for a yearly bandwidth growth
between 20% to 60% [1], [2]. With the advent of upcoming
Manuscript received July 15, 2019; revised November 15, 2019 and December
18, 2019; accepted December 21, 2019. Date of publication January 22, 2020;
date of current version March 11, 2020. This work was partially supported
by Infinera and Instituto de Telecomunicações, via the SECTOR project, by
the H2020 Metro-Haul project under Grant agreement number 761727 and by
FCT/MEC through national funds and when applicable co-funded by FEDER –
PT2020 partnership agreement under the project UID/EEA/50008/2019. (Cor-
responding author: Victor Lopez.)
V. Lopez is with the Telefónica GCTO, c/Ronda de la Comunicación s/n,
28050 Madrid, Spain (e-mail: victor.lopezalvarez@telefonica.com).
B. Zhu is with the OFS Labs, Somerset, NJ 08873 USA (e-mail:
bzhu@ofsoptics.com).
D. Moniz and J. Pedro are with the Infinera Unipessoal, Lda., Rua da Garagem,
1, 2790-078 Carnaxide, Portugal, and also with the Instituto de Telecomuni-
cações, Instituto Superior Técnico, The University of Lisbon, 1049-001 Lisboa,
Portugal (e-mail: dmoniz@infinera.com; jpedro@infinera.com).
N. Costa is with the Infinera Unipessoal, Lda., 2790-078 Carnaxide, Portugal
(e-mail: ncosta@infinera.com).
X. Xu, A. Kumpera, L. Dardis, J. Rahn, and S. Sanders are with
the Infinera Corporation, 140 Caspian Ct, Sunnyvale, CA 94089 USA
(e-mail: xxu@infinera.com; akumpera@infinera.com; ldardis@infinera.com;
jeffrahn@infinera.com; ssanders@infinera.com).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this article are available online
at https://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/JLT.2020.2968225
0733-8724 © 2020 IEEE. Personal use is permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission.
See https://www.ieee.org/publications/rights/index.html for more information.
Fig. 1. Low loss transmission bands of single-mode fiber [5].
innovations such as 5G and high-capacity access networks, such
a trend will continue. However, there is a need to reduce power
consumption and cost per bit to maintain the telecommunication
ecosystem. Optical transmission networks are the only solution
that can cope with this continuous bandwidth growth. As an
example, a 1.2 Tb/s multi-carrier super-channel based upon 12
× 100 G waves (PM-16QAM) can provide 24 Tb/s in 4.8 THz
extended C-Band for scenarios up to 900 km. However, this
massive bandwidth is not enough for several scenarios (data
center interconnect, metro networks, national backbones, and
submarine cables).
To deal with such amount of traffic, fiber owners have to
decide either to deploy new fibers or to upgrade their existing
infrastructures. Fiber deployment plans are a periodical process
aimed at guaranteeing that the network can support the traffic
forecast and deal with failure scenarios. On the other hand, the
massive investments forces to exploit the fiber for decades. There
are some scenarios where deploying or using new fibers is not
economically the first option, either because fibers are rented,
or local regulation does not allow to increase the footprint in a
particular area. Therefore, it is highly essential to exploit fiber
assets as much as possible. When considering the Total Cost
of Ownership (TCO) analysis, the components cost is marginal
when compared with the fiber cost in specific scenarios [3].
There are three main approaches to increase the bandwidth
in optical networks: multi-fiber, multi-band (MB), and spatial
division multiplexing (SDM). Multi-fiber and MB transmission
are mid-term approaches, while SDM is a long-term approach.
Authors in [4] compare the three approaches in different sce-
narios. This paper focuses on C&L-band transmission, which is
an MB approach. MB technique transmits over the entire SMF
spectrum (see Fig. 1) [5]. To extend a network from current C-
to C&L-band, there are several aspects that have to be analyzed:
components, fiber, planning and optical line system design.
LOPEZ et al.: OPTIMIZED DESIGN AND CHALLENGES FOR C&L BAND OPTICAL LINE SYSTEMS
Authors in [5] present a full overview of the components and
technology to enable MB transmission over single-mode fibers
(SMFs).
The contribution of this article is to present an evolutionary
approach to C&L-band technologies from a network design
perspective. It covers from fiber capabilities, network demand
optimization as well as system performance to provide a realistic
view of the C&L-band technology. Optical fibers have evolved,
and their features have been adapted to provide better transmis-
sion characteristics. Section II presents the fiber design evolution
for C&L-band transmission. As optical amplifiers are a crucial
element to support C&L-band technologies, Section III illus-
trates the design for C- and L-band amplifiers. L-band amplifiers
require changes to the doping types used in C-band to achieve
the required gain. Section IV carries out the design of a C&L
network. This section covers the multi-period planning work-
flow with an illustrative network planning analysis. Section V
presents the extension of the work in [6] showing 56.4 Tb/s
capacity when using transponders across the C&L bands over
an 800 km fiber link containing Infinera reconfigurable optical
add-drop multiplexers (ROADM’s) and optical line amplifiers.
Finally, Section VI highlights the conclusions.
II. FIBER DESIGN EVOLUTION FOR C&L TRANSMISSIONS
Optical fibers as one of the critical enabling technologies
for optical communications have evolved for several decades,
and their optical properties have been engineered for low sys-
tem cost and high transmission performance. In on-off-keying
(OOK) systems, optical fibers were primarily designed to bal-
ance chromatic dispersion characteristics with influence from
non-linear impairments and attenuation. For example, in very
first EDFA based systems, the dispersion-shifted fiber (DSF)
with chromatic dispersion close to 0 ps/nm/km at 1550 nm was
selected to minimize the accumulated dispersion at the end of
the link. The introduction of wavelength division multiplexing
(WDM) technologies required moving the chromatic dispersion
zero away from the signal wavelengths to reduce the inter-
channel non-linear penalty. Non-zero-dispersion-shifted-fibers
(NZDSF) with chromatic dispersion around 4 ∼ 8 ps/nm/km
have been developed for this reason. The NZDSF was also
designed to support broad-band dispersion and dispersion slope
compensation in C&L-band, enhance Raman amplification, and
reduce the total system penalties due to non-linear impairments
[7]. With the development of coherent systems using advanced
modulation formats, chromatic dispersion, and polarization-
mode-dispersion (PMD) can be digitally compensated. How-
ever, polarization-division multiplexed (PDM) coherent systems
are more susceptible to fiber non-linear effects (e.g., cross-
polarization modulation (XPolM) [8]).
Furthermore, coherent systems employ multi-level modula-
tion formats, such as 16 ∼ 64 QAM, which require much
higher optical signal to noise ratio (OSNR) to scale data rate
up to 400Gb/s and beyond. Hence, the effective area (Aeff ) and
attenuation parameter of optical fibers is critical to reduce the
impacts of non-linear fiber transmission and improve system
OSNR. Recently, a new class of optical fibers with large Aeff
1081
TABLE I
KEY FIBER PROPERTIES OF LARGE-AREA ULTRA-LOW LOSS
FIBERS AT 1550 NM
in the 120–153 μm2 range and ultra-low attenuation ∼0.155
dB/km has been developed for both terrestrial and submarine
systems. These fibers also present high chromatic dispersion,
which reduces the non-linear effects in PDM coherent systems.
Non-linearities are proportional to n2 /Aeff , where n2 is the
non-linear refractive index. To reduce fiber non-linearity, it is
necessary to increase Aeff of fiber while not jeopardizing the
bending performances. Step index profiles with small index
differences and large core diameters can be used to design
such fibers. However, the light confinement in the core becomes
weaker, increasing the cut-off wavelength and degrading both
macro- and micro-bending performance. Placing a depressed
index region in the cladding, or placing a trench, slightly apart
from the core can improve the bending performance and reduce
the cut-off wavelength. A low Young’s modulus primary coating
can also be used to improve the micro- and macro-bending
performance and to permit a higher Aeff .
Recently, several new large-area ultra-low loss fibers have
been developed by leading fiber manufacturing companies. As
an example, Table I shows critical fiber parameters at 1550 nm of
some new types of transmission fibers by major fiber companies
[9], [10]. Some of them, with very low attenuation, are designed
for transoceanic distance transmissions while others provide
cost-effective solutions for terrestrial applications showing ex-
cellent performance in both C&L-bands (1530 nm–1625 nm).
For example, the average loss at 1550 nm for a commercially
available SCUBA150 fiber is 0.154 dB/km, while the average
loss at 1610 nm is 0.162 dB/km, only 0.008 dB/km higher
than at 1550 nm. Moreover, the average values of Aeff and
dispersion for the SCUBA150 fiber at 1610 nm are 157.3 μm2
and 25.8 ps/nm/km, respectively, thus leading to a small impact
of non-linear fiber transmission effects in L-band [11].
The large Aeff fibers are I-TUT G.654 E/D compliant (cut-off
shifted single-mode fiber) [12]. The macro- and micro-bending
performances of the TeraWave fibers are improved by optimized
waveguide design. They use advanced coating technologies for
excellent bending performance and meet all macro-bending
requirements in G.654.E/D. Fig. 2 shows an example of the Ter-
aWave SCUBA125 30 mm diameter macrobending performance
plotted as a function of the fiber MAC-value, showing excellent
macrobending performance over a wide range of MAC value
both at 1550 and 1625 nm. The MAC-value is a fiber bending
1082
Fig. 2. Measured 30 mm diameter macrobending performance as a function
of the fiber MAC factor.
sensitivity metric defined as the mode field diameter divided
by the cut-off wavelength. As a reference, the ITU-T G.657.A1
requirements for 30 mm diameter macrobending are <0.025 and
<0.1 dB/turn at 1550 and 1625 nm, respectively. Fig. 2 illustrates
that the 30 mm diameter macrobending loss at 1625 nm is less
than 0.04 dB/turn over a wide range of MAC values, exhibiting
excellent bending performance in L-band.
It should be noted that the SCUBA fiber has a typical at-
tenuation of 0.155 dB/km at 1550 nm. The utilization of a
Ge-free silica core fiber design not only achieves an ultra-low
loss fiber but also reduces the Rayleigh scattering. An additional
advantage of the silica core design is a lower non-linear refractive
index n2 that provides more than 6% mitigation of non-linearity
compared to Ge-doped standard single-mode fibers [13].
From a system performance point of view, it is also crucial
to ensure small splicing loss when deploying large Aeff fibers.
An acceptable splice loss needs to be achieved between the large
Aeff fiber to itself as well as to smaller Aeff fiber (e.g., to standard
single-mode fiber - SSMF). The former is essential since a fiber
span between two amplification sites typically consists of several
shorter length fiber sections, which are spliced together (often
every 6-10km). Hence, low splice loss between two large Aeff
fiber segments result in lower span loss. The last part is also
important as the large Aeff fiber needs to be spliced to smaller Aeff
fiber pigtails of amplifiers. Therefore, low splice loss between
two fibers with different Aeff results in a lower overall span loss.
Our systematic splicing studies show that low splicing losses
can be achieved in OFS TeraWave fibers. As an example, vol-
ume splicing experiments using commercially available splicers
(e.g., Fitel S179A) show that the average splice loss between
TeraWave SCUBA125 fiber and TeraWave SCUBA125 fiber is
<0.03 dB/splice. The average splice loss between TeraWave
SCUBA125 fiber and SSMF is 0.15 dB/splice.
III. DOPED FIBERS FOR WIDEBAND AMPLIFIER
The Er-doped fiber amplifier (EDFA) is the most efficient
optical amplifier for wideband repeaters in transport systems,
and Er-doped fiber (EDF) is the crucial element to build EDFA
repeaters. High power conversion efficiency (PCE), low noise
figure (NF), and wide bandwidth is essential for C&L-band
applications. For C-band only EDFA, up to about 38 nm can
JOURNAL OF LIGHTWAVE TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 38, NO. 5, MARCH 1, 2020
Fig. 3. Achievable gain shape for C-band (a) using MP980 EDF, and L-band
(b) using LRL EDF.
be readily developed by using Al co-doped EDFs highly [14],
[15]. The limit for large gain bandwidth EDFA comes from the
shape of the EDF gain spectrum, as shown below. Increasing
depth and steep edges of gain flattening filter (GFF) are required
for amplifier with bandwidth greater than 38 nm. Currently, the
practical useful bandwidth of a C-band EDFA is limited to about
40 ∼ 42 nm. To further increase the EDFA bandwidth, precision
build, and athermal packaging of gain equalization are required
to keep gain shape error within acceptable limits. Fig. 3(a) shows
the gain shape of an example design for a typical one-stage
EDFA with co-pumping 976 nm diode using OFS MP980 EDF
[16]. In this example, the EDFA is designed to have a maximum
output power of 22 dBm, with an average gain of 20 dB. The gain
ripple (ΔG) of about 2.9 dB is obtained for a 38 nm bandwidth
amplifier, whereas the gain ripple increases to 4.8 dB if the
bandwidth increases to 42 nm. In this example, the utilization
of high-efficiency EDF provides a PCE without GFF of about
44%. However, the net PCE (after GFF) for 38 nm EDFA is
about 30%, while the net PCE for 42 nm EDFA is only about
20% due to the increase of depth of the gain ripple. Therefore, a
trade-off between PCE and bandwidth is necessary in practical
implementation of EDFA repeaters.
An L-band EDFA requires a low population inversion for
a flat gain operation. The gain coefficient of EDF in L-band
is also ∼3–4 times smaller than in C-band. So, the L-band
EDFA usually require longer erbium coils than C-band. Draw-
backs on this approach are, as an example, lower PCE, poor
LOPEZ et al.: OPTIMIZED DESIGN AND CHALLENGES FOR C&L BAND OPTICAL LINE SYSTEMS 1083

NF, and increased susceptibility to FWM non-linearity (in the A. QoT Estimation
EDF). Besides, the backward amplifier spontaneous emission
Since only modulation formats based on phase-modulation
(ASE) power (peaked in the C-band) affects the PCE. A higher
and coherent-detection are considered in this work, the well-
concentration of Er helps to reduce the EDF length. However,
known Gaussian noise approach is used to estimate the impact
increasing Er content degrades PCE due to the pair-induced
of non-linear interference (NLI) originated in the optical fiber
quenching. Therefore, a comprehensive optimization design on
transmission. Moreover, taking also into account that the main
the doping types, concentration and waveguide structure is even
objective of this work is to compare the potential of different
more important for L-band EDF. We have developed several
technologies and design strategies and not to do an actual optical
high-performance EDFs for L-band applications. Fig. 3(b) illus-
network deployment, a rough estimate of the optical system
trates the gain shape of an L-band EDFA with one co-pumping
performance is sufficient, thus avoiding very time consuming
stage using a 976 nm pump diode. In this example, the EDFA is
simulations. Therefore, the QoT is estimated using an approach
designed to have an output power of 22 dBm, with an average
similar to the one proposed in [14]:
gain of 20 dB using 14.6 meter of OFS LRL EDF [16]. The gain
ripples of 2.5 dB and 3.0 dB can be readily obtained for 40 and PT x
OSN Req = , (1)
42 nm bandwidth amplifiers, respectively, and the average NF PASE + PN LI
is around 4 B in this design. Hence, a total bandwidth exceeding where PTx is the optical signal average power level, PASE is
80 nm can be practically achieved using the C&L-band EDFAs, the ASE noise power originating in optical amplifiers and PNLI
thus enabling C&L-band transmission. is the NLI contribution to noise. Incoherent noise accumulation
along the link is assumed, which has the advantage of allow-
IV. DESIGN OF WIDEBAND WDM SYSTEMS ing the evaluation of the NLI contribution of each fiber span
independently of the remaining link.
The effectiveness of the deployment of wideband WDM The QoT is evaluated by calculating the residual margin (RM)
systems depends on the adopted technologies and design strate- defined as the difference between the total available OSNR
gies that can lead to different CAPEX implications. The study (OSNReq,tot ) and the required OSNR for a given signal quality
reported in this section assumes a multi-layer Optical transport in back-to-back (B2B). However, in order to cope with addi-
network (OTN) over Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing tional transmission effects, an additional system margin is also
(DWDM) architecture, enabling to efficiently multiplex differ- considered. Therefore, the final RM is given by:
ent services onto optical channels. The optical channels consist
either in single-carrier channels or in superchannels resulting RM = OSN Req,tot − OSN RB2B − Margin. (2)
from the aggregation of multiple carriers.
In this work, the system margin has two contributions: a
This section provides a detailed analysis of the impact of
2 dB margin, set to guarantee that the system still operates
adopting three different design strategies when deploying C-
correctly after aging and to accommodate the power ripple along
and C&L-band transmission systems on the number of deployed
the transmission bandwidth and polarization dependent losses,
optical fibers and number of line interfaces. Both C- and L-bands
and an additional fixed system margin of 0.05 dB every time
are modelled as having a total bandwidth of 4.8 THz, which
a ROADM is traversed by a lightpath (to accommodate for the
corresponds to a total of 384 frequency slots of 12.5 GHz in
impact of optical filtering).
each band. In detail, the first design scenario considers the
Two fiber types are considered in this study: SSMF, character-
use of current state-of-the-art line interfaces (CIF), operating
ized by a dispersion parameter of 17 ps/nm/km, an attenuation
at 32 Gbaud, allocated over 50 GHz frequency slots and oper-
of 0.21 dB/km and a non-linear coefficient of 1.3/W/km and
ating with QPSK and 16-QAM. Note that this is a meaningful
LEAF, characterized by a dispersion parameter of 3.8 ps/nm/km,
scenario, particularly because a large fraction of the optical net-
an attenuation of 0.22 dB/km and a non-linear coefficient of
works deployed today have a fixed 50 GHz grid and upgrading
1.5/W/km. The power launched into each optical fiber is opti-
them to a flexible grid would require replacing all the filter cards.
mized in order to maximize the “equivalent” OSNR. A power
The second one still assumes the deployment of state-of-the-art
level per channel of 1 dBm is set at each ROADM input by a
line interfaces but considers a flexible DWDM grid, enabling
pre-amplifier. The optical signal is attenuated by 15 dB in add
superchannel configurations (CIF-SC) with six carriers allocated
and drop ROADMs and by 18 dB in the pass-through ROADMs.
in 225 GHz frequency slots and supporting QPSK, 8-QAM and
The noise figure of optical amplifiers is set to 6 and 7 dB for
16-QAM modulation formats. Finally, the last scenario assumes
C- and L-band amplifiers, respectively. In case of C&L-band
the use of next-generation of line interfaces (NGIF) operating
transmission, and to guarantee that a lightpath that is assumed
at 63 Gbaud and supporting modulation formats ranging from
as feasible without 3R is feasible in both C- and L-bands, only
QPSK up to 64-QAM, where each channel is allocated over
the worse QoT (obtained in L-band) is considered.
75 GHz frequency slots. A soft-decision forward error correction
(SD-FEC) is assumed in both cases, with an overhead of 15%.
The quality-of-transmission (QoT) and service provisioning B. Service Provisioning Workflow
planning algorithm depend on the transmission system and sce- The CAPEX implications of adopting the different design
nario. Thus, the next subsections describe the main differences strategies are evaluated by calculating the minimum number
associated to each scenario. of single-carrier channels or carriers within the superchannels
1084 JOURNAL OF LIGHTWAVE TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 38, NO. 5, MARCH 1, 2020

L Generic set of available optical channels that de-

pending the scenario can be defined as single-
carrier channels or superchannels.
Cl Capacity available per optical channel l ∈ L.
Li,j Generic set of available optical channels between
the source node i and destination node j.
Ld Sub-set of optical channels deployed per traffic
demand already assigned in the previous planning
periods d ∈ T .
Le Set of optical channels that traverse link e ∈ E.
Xl Total number of 1.25 Gbit/s timeslots available
per optical channel l ∈ L, which depends on the
bit-rate of the channel.
Nd Total number of traffic demands for each d ∈ D.
Cd Capacity required per traffic demand d ∈ D.
Wd,l Total number of traffic demands for each d ∈ T
that used the optical channel l ∈ Ld in the previ-
ous planning periods.
F Number of 12.5 GHz frequency slots available per
network link.
Fig. 4. Multi-period planning workflow.
Q Number of 12.5 GHz frequency slots allocated to
optical channels l ∈ L.
Sd Number of 1.25 Gbit/s timeslots used to aggregate
and optical fibers deployed in each case. The flowchart of the
d ∈ D into a channel, which depends on the bit-
planning workflow is depicted in Fig. 4.
rate of each traffic demand.
The framework assumes an incremental multi-period scenario
which receives as input the network topology and the new set of Variables
l
traffic demands at each planning period. For each traffic demand, λd(i,j)
(s,t)
∈N Number of traffic demands of type d ∈ D between
a set of routing paths is first computed and the most spectral source node s and destination node t using optical
efficient modulation format that does not require 3R regeneration channel l ∈ L with source node i and destination
is selected. Afterwards, an Integer Linear Programming (ILP) node j.
model, adapted to each design strategy, is used to minimize θl ∈ N Number of carriers deployed per superchannel of
the number of carriers deployed through the selection of the type l ∈ L.
best path for each traffic demand. The optimization process also πl ∈ N Number of required superchannels of type l ∈ L.
allows to aggregate the small traffic units into the larger size op- γ∈N Total number of carriers that have to be assigned
tical channels. In order to balance optimality and complexity, the in the superchannels deployed.
spectrum and fibers assignment is performed through a heuristic μl ∈ N Number of required single-carrier channels of
algorithm that aims to minimize the number of fibers deployed type l ∈ L.
according to the routing and grooming solution provided by the ω∈N Total number of single-carrier channels that have
ILP. to be deployed.

C. ILP Models The following formulation describes ILP-1 model, which

This subsection introduces the ILP model indicated in Fig. 4. has the objective of minimizing the number of single-carriers
Two variants of the ILP are considered: i) one that minimizes the deployed.
number of single-carriers used in the CIF and NGIF scenarios
(ILP-1) and ii) another one that minimizes the number of total
superchannel carriers deployed in the CIF-SC case (ILP-2). Both min ω (3)
ILP models use the following variables and input algorithms. subject to
Parameters
V Set of network nodes. λld = Wd,l ∀d ∈ T, ∀l ∈ Ld (4)
E Set of network links.  l  l
λd(i,j), − λd(i,j)
D Total set of traffic demands. (s,t) (s,t)
l∈Li,j=v l∈Li=v,j
T Sub-set of traffic demands already allocated in the ⎧
previous planning periods. ⎨ −Nd , v = s
R Sub-set of traffic demands introduced in the cur- Nd , v=t ∀d ∈ R (5)
⎩
rent planning period. 0, ∀ v ∈ V \ {s, t}
LOPEZ et al.: OPTIMIZED DESIGN AND CHALLENGES FOR C&L BAND OPTICAL LINE SYSTEMS 1085


Sd × λld ≤ Xl × μl ∀l ∈ L (6) Algorithm 1: Spectrum and Fibers Assignment.
d∈D
Input: Set of carriers to be deployed (C), Spectrum, l_bound

Q × μl ≤ F ∀e ∈ E (7) (maximum number of cases to consider)
l∈Le 1 Initialize an empty list, cBlock, which will indicate the
 carriers blocked during the assignment process.
μl = ω (8) 2 for each carrier in C, c
l∈L 3 Search for freq, the first available position (in
The objective function (1) consists of minimizing the number Spectrum) with the already deployed optical fiber
of carriers that have to be deployed. Constraints (2) impose infrastructure
that the traffic demands already deployed in previous planning 4 if there is no available freq
periods are kept in the same channels and (3) select the optical 5 Add c to cBlock list
channel path to be used by each traffic demand. The optical 6 if cBlock is not empty
channel capacity restrictions are set by constraints (4) and (5), 7 Get the network links that are traversed by the
guarantying that the total number of frequency slots used does carriers assigned to cBlock in descending order of
not exceed the link capacity. Finally, constraint (6) calculate the unavailable frequencies in Spectrum, Lblk
total number of carriers that have to be provisioned to meet the 8 if length(Lblk )> l_bound
set of traffic demands. 9 Limit the links in Lblk to l_bound
The ILP-2 focuses on the minimization of the number of 10 Generate the set Cf of combinations in ascending
carriers assigned per superchannel deployed in the CIF-SC order of the number of fibers deployed containing
scenario. the addition of a maximum of one fiber for each link
Lblk
min γ 11 for each configuration in Cf
12 Check if it enables to assign all the carriers
subject to
included in cBlock list
(2)–(3) from the definition of ILP-1 11 if exists one successful configuration
 12 Update the number of fibers deployed
Sd × λld ≤ Xl × πl ∀l ∈ L (9) 13 else
d∈D
14 Select the configuration leading to the lowest

Q × πl ≤ F ∀e ∈ E (10) number of carriers to be assigned and fibers
l∈Le required
 15 Add fibers to the network links that are traversed
Cd × λld ≤ Cl × θl ∀l ∈ L (11) by the carriers to be assigned
d∈D 16 return (updated spectrum and number of fibers
 deployed)
θl = γ (12)
l∈L

The ILP-2 model requires using different variables to repre-
sent the number of superchannels and carriers deployed. The
former is used to calculate the number of occupied frequency
slots in each network link (7)–(8), whereas the latter is respon-
sible for computing the objective function (9)–(10).
D. Heuristic Algorithm
The ILP model is complemented by a heuristic algorithm that
performs the spectrum and fibers assignment according to the
total number of carriers (single or aggregated in superchannel
configuration) deployed given by the ILP model. The algorithm
is described by the pseudocode in Algorithm 1.
The algorithm starts by trying to assign the carriers deployed
to the available spectrum. In case of unavailability, a set of com-
binations corresponding to deploying additional optical fibers
to the most demanding network links are evaluated. In order to
reduce the complexity of the heuristic algorithm, a maximum
number of network links to add fibers in the combinations,
l_bound, is received as an input (and set to ten in this work).
Afterwards, the algorithm tries to assign the remaining blocked
carriers to one of the new combinations of fibers. If none of
them allows to successfully allocate all carriers, the algorithm
selects the combination with lowest number of carriers still to be
assigned and fibers deployed and sequentially deploys fibers in
the network links that are traversed by the carriers that could not
be assigned in the first instance. Finally, the algorithm returns
the updated spectrum and set of new fibers that have to be set up.
E. Results and discussion
To properly evaluate the benefits of moving from a single-
band to a multi-band transmission system, three design strategies
(CIF, CIF-SC and NGIF) were considered through a detailed
simulation using the Spanish Backbone Network (SBN) and
the Italian Backbone Network (IBN) defined by Telefónica and
Telecom Italy, respectively, in the scope of the FP7 IDEALIST
project [15]. The SBN topology has 30 reconfigurable optical
add-drop multiplexer (ROADM) nodes interconnected by 56
network links using SSMF fiber spans, whereas the IBN has
44 ROADM nodes interconnected by 71 network links using
SSMF and LEAF fiber spans. The simulation assumes a 10 year
1086
Fig. 5. Evolution of traffic growth per planning period.
network lifetime with six months between planning periods, 100
and 200 Gb/s traffic demands between 13% of the node-pairs
(randomly generated) with a traffic growth of 26% per year,
following the forecast provided by [1]. The evolution of the
traffic growth is depicted in Fig. 5. The traffic demands are routed
over one of the available grooming possibilities along the three
shortest routing paths. The simulation results are averaged over
20 independent runs.
The analysis is mainly divided into two sets of results. First,
the number of fibers that have to be deployed in a C-band only
and C&L transmission system when considering the three differ-
ent design strategies is assessed. Note that, when the capacity is
exhausted, the algorithm assumes the deployment of additional
optical fibers to transport the remaining data. Afterwards, the
number of carriers required to satisfy all traffic demands along
the different planning periods is assessed, allowing to compare
the expected line interfaces count when considering the two
different transmission systems (C-band only versus C&L bands)
and the three design strategies.
Fig. 6(a)–(b) depicts the optical fiber count in SBN and IBN,
respectively, when current state-of-the-art line interfaces are
used in a CIF and in a CIF-SC configuration, whereas Fig. 6(c)–
(d) focuses in the comparison of the state-of-the-art with the
next-generation of line interfaces for both network topologies.
The analysis of Fig. 6(a) shows that switching from C-band
only to C&L-band transmission allows postponing additional
fiber deployment by up to 6 planning periods (3 years) for all
design strategies. Taking into account the 26% yearly increase
of traffic, this translates into an increase of the carried traffic
load of around 100% for the same optical fiber infrastructure.
Fig. 6(a) shows also that there is a clear benefit from deploying
state-of-art line interfaces using a superchannel configuration
since it allows further reducing the optical fibers count (both for
C- and C&L-band systems). Additionally, Fig. 6(b) highlights
that the next-generation of line interfaces will further postpone
the investment in the optical fiber infrastructure. Using NGIF
enables savings of about 21% and 15% in the optical fiber
count when compared with the CIF scenario when exploiting the
C- and C&L-bands, respectively. Considering a larger network
such as the IBN leads to similar trends. However, the benefit of
super-channel configurations is mitigated, as shown in Fig. 6(b).
JOURNAL OF LIGHTWAVE TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 38, NO. 5, MARCH 1, 2020
This is a consequence of reserving larger chunks of spectrum in
a network where some of the links are traversed by channels
with a larger number of different end nodes. As a result, earlier
spectrum exhaustion in some links will lead to the need to route
channels over longer and less spectral efficient paths, which can
offset the improved spectral efficiency of this configuration when
compared to that of single-carrier channels.
In order to illustrate the benefit of adopting the C&L trans-
mission system combined with the deployment of NGIF de-
sign strategy, Fig. 7 depicts the number of fibers deployed per
network link in SBN for the same scenarios as presented in
Fig. 6(c) considering the last planning period only. Fig. 7 helps
visualizing the spread of extra fibers in the network, highlighting
the most loaded links for the different scenarios. The resulting
observation emphasizes the benefit from using next-generation
line interfaces combined with a C&L-band transmission system.
The last set of results focuses on the number of carriers that
have to be deployed, thus imposing the line interfaces count and,
ultimately, the CAPEX. Fig. 8(a)–(b) and (c)–(d) depict the num-
ber of carriers required to carry all traffic demands throughout
the network lifecycle considering the C- and C&L-band trans-
mission scenarios and comparing the CIF with the CIF-SC and
the CIF with the NGIF strategies, respectively. Fig. 8 shows that
there is a minor increase in the number of carriers when moving
from the C- to the C&L-band transmission system resulting
from a slight degradation of optical performance in L-band with
respect to C-band, thus occasionally preventing the use of higher
order modulation formats in some of the longer optical channels.
Another key finding is that, when comparing the state-of-art
line interfaces with single-carrier channel and superchannel
configurations, both attain almost the same number of carriers.
However, the use of superchannels with six carriers allocated
over 225 GHz can allow to be more spectral-efficient and reduce
the number of fibers that have to be deployed (as shown in
Fig. 6(a)). The most significant savings in the number of carriers
results mainly from using next-generation line interfaces (for
both C- and C&L-band transmission systems). These savings
are a consequence of using higher order modulation formats (up
to 64-QAM) and symbol rates, which increase the maximum
total capacity supported per carrier. When comparing the NGIF
and CIF in a C&L-band transmission scenario, the former is
able to reduce the number of carriers provisioned by up to 60%.
Importantly, these savings are possible without compromising
the spectral efficiency, since using the next-generation of line
interfaces is also the strategy that enables having the minimum
number of fibers, as shown for example in Fig. 6(c).
V. ULTRA-HIGH CAPACITY TRANSMISSION USING TIGHT
CARRIER PACKING IN C AND L BANDS
As stated in the introduction of this paper, this section extends
the work in [6] and [19], where the authors demonstrated L-
band superchannel transponders with 600 km transmission and
27.6 Tb/s capacity over the 4.8 THz extended C-band bandwidth
using Nyquist shaped superchannels with a 6% roll-off factor.
In this paper, Infinera C&L-band superchannel transponders are
used to achieve 56.4 Tb/s capacity across the C&L band over
LOPEZ et al.: OPTIMIZED DESIGN AND CHALLENGES FOR C&L BAND OPTICAL LINE SYSTEMS
Fig. 6. Evolution of the number of fibers deployed along the network lifetime with C and C&L transmission systems for the (a)–(b) CIF and CIF-SC and (c)–(d)
CIF and NGIF for SBN and IBN network topologies, respectively.
an 800 km fiber link containing Infinera ROADM’s and optical
line amplifiers.
Coherent transponders in the C- and L-band with near Nyquist
limited carrier spacing are a key enabler to achieving maximum
link capacity. Fig. 9(a) shows the measured, fully loaded trans-
mitted and received C&L band spectra from our transmission
link. Each coherent transponder card [19], [20] transmits and
receives 6 channels operating at a 32 Gbaud dual-polarization
16-QAM on a 33 GHz channel spacing to form a 200 GHz wide
superchannel, providing 1.2 Tbit/sec capacity per transponder
card, as illustrated in Fig. 9(b). Such a tight spacing, beyond
what is attainable with conventional single carrier light sources,
is enabled by an ultra-low roll-off factor (1/64), monolithic
integration of all transmitter lasers on the same substrate, and the
locking of all 6 carriers to a single wave-locking element. In this
experiment, we grouped four 6 carrier superchannels together
in each band and filled in the remaining spectrum with ASE to
emulate full loading. The superchannels were then tuned across
the bands and the ASE adjusted to allow the performance to be
measured over the full C&L-bandwidth. The total capacity in
this experiment was 56.4 Tb/s on 282 carriers with 200 Gb/s per
carrier. Note that the L-band spectral bandwidth was limited in
these measurements to 4.6 THz due to the use of prototype line
1087
amplifiers, as compared with the Infinera production L-band
amplifiers that will support 4.8 THz bandwidth. When both
bands are fully populated, and the final L-Band amplifier design
is used, these coherent transponders will enable up to 57.6 Tb/s
capacity over the 9.6 THz of combined C&L.
A schematic of the C&L-band transmission system is shown
in Fig. 10. At the head end node, four 200 GHz spaced C-band
superchannels from four coherent transponders are multiplexed
by a commercial C-band ROADM along with a C-band ASE
signal. Four 200 GHz spaced L-band superchannels from four
coherent transponders are multiplexed by an L-band wavelength
selective switch (WSS) followed by a prototype L-band EDFA
along with an L-band ASE signal. The multiplexed C- and L-
band superchannels are then combined by a band coupler before
launching into the line system. The terrestrial line system used in
the experiment consists of 8 spans of 100 km SMF-28 fiber, each
span followed by a hybrid Raman/EDFA optical line amplifier
to compensate the approximately 20 dB fiber loss. The hybrid
amplifiers use a backward Raman pump to provide Raman gain
over the full C&L-band spectrum. The Raman stage is followed
by an integrated C-band EDFA and an external prototype L-band
EDFA to amplify separately the C- and L-band signals. In the tail
end node, a band splitter sends the C-band light to the C-band
1088 JOURNAL OF LIGHTWAVE TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 38, NO. 5, MARCH 1, 2020

Fig. 7. Illustration of the number of fibers deployed per network link in the SBN topology with C and C&L transmission systems considering CIF and NGIF
design scenarios.

Fig. 8. Evolution of the cumulative number of carriers provisioned along the network lifetime with C and C&L bands for (a)–(b) CIF and CIF-SC and (c)–(d)
CIF and NGIF for SBN and IBN network topologies, respectively.
LOPEZ et al.: OPTIMIZED DESIGN AND CHALLENGES FOR C&L BAND OPTICAL LINE SYSTEMS 1089

Fig. 9. (a) Measured fully loaded C&L transmitted and received spectra; transmitted spectrum was measured at the band coupler tap out; received spectrum was
measured at the pre-amplifier input tap out; (b) measured high resolution (150 MHz) spectrum at the 6-carrier transponder output.

Fig. 10 Schematic of the C&L-band transmission system.

ROADM and the L-band light to an L-band EDFA followed by
an L-band WSS. The C-band ROADM and the L-band WSS
route the C- and L-band superchannels to their four receivers,
respectively.
To facilitate the system operation and optimize the transmis-
sion performance, this line system adopts automated link power
and tilt controls. This line system is designed to meet the require-
ments of a well-engineered C&L-band line system: (i) allowing
the utilization of the entire extended C-band before adding any
L-band specific amplifiers or transponders and incurring their
associated costs; (ii) allowing addition of the L-band traffic with-
out disruption to the existing C-band traffic; and (iii) operating
over a wide range of loading conditions without the need for
ASE idlers, yet supporting ASE idler insertion when warranted.
The pre-FEC bit-error rates of the 282 channels across the
C&L-bands are converted to Q-factors which are shown in
Fig. 11. All channels are error-free after FEC decoding. The
two channels on the red edge of the L-band have lower Q than
other channels due to the gain roll-off of the prototype L-band
EDFA’s used in the experiment. The L-band channels exhibit
a slightly larger Q spread than the C-band channels due to the
non-optimal gain flattening filter used in these prototype L-band
EDFAs.
Fig. 11 Q spectrum across the C&L-band.
VI. CONCLUSION
Optical communications are the key enabler to maintain an
ever-increasing traffic demand growth. Network deployments
are becoming more challenged to cope with such massive band-
width increment. Fiber deployment and planning process is a
strategic, but slow and costly activity for network operators that
requires many resources. The strategic fiber plan is a long-term
view, requiring high CAPEX investment to deploy fiber pairs
across the countries. C&L-band technologies are now a mature
approach to extend existing fiber capacity. There are alterna-
tives, such as multi-fiber and SDM techniques. However, these
approaches require more technological evolution to become a
reality in production networks.
This article shows the evolution of C&L-band transmission
from the network perspective. It covers optimized transmission
and Er-doped fiber capabilities, demand optimization, and sys-
tem performance demonstration to provide a realistic view of
the technology. In fact, a total transmission capacity of 56.4 Tb/s
1090
across the C&L-bands over an 800 km fiber link was experimen-
tally demonstrated, as an example of the technological maturity.
C&L-band technologies have evolved during the last few years
to a point where the technology is now a candidate solution for
those scenarios that require extending fiber lifetime.
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Victor Lopez received the M.Sc. degree in 2005 and the Ph.D. degree from
Universidad Autonoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain, in 2009. He is currently a
Technology Expert with Systems and Network Global Direction, Telefónica
GCTIO, Madrid, Spain. He works on the global IP and transport processes of
the Telefonica group. He is currently the Co-Chair with the Open Optical Packet
Transport group in the Telecom Infra Project. He started his carrier in Telefónica
I+D as a Researcher in 2004. In 2006, he moved to Universidad Autonoma de
Madrid and became an Assistant Professor in 2009. In 2011, he joined Telefonica
I+D as a Technology specialist working on funded research projects from the
Telefonica group and the European Commission. He has coauthored more than
200 publications, six patents, and contributed to IETF and ONF. His research
interests include the integration of Internet services over IP/MPLS and optical
networks and SDN technologies.
Benyuan Zhu received the Ph.D. degree in physics from Bath University, Bath,
U.K., in 1996. He joined Bell Laboratories, Lucent Technologies, Holmdel, NJ,
USA, as a member of Technical Staff, in 1999. Since 2011, he has been a Dis-
tinguished Member of Technical Staff (DMTS) with OFS Labs, Norcross, GA,
USA, where he focuses on high-speed DWDM transmission system, new fibers,
and advanced amplifier technologies development. He has authored/coauthored
more than 200 journal/conference papers, one book chapter, and holds more
than 25 US patents. He has various conference tutorial and invited speaker for
FiO, ECOC, and OFC. He was a Technical Program Committee (TPC) member
or TPC Chair for the conferences of OFC, IPC, and ACP. He was an Associate
Editor for the Electronics Letters and Optics Express.
Daniela Moniz received the M.Sc. degree in electrical and computer engineering
from the Instituto Superior Técnico, Lisboa, Portugal, in 2015. She is currently
working toward the Ph.D. degree with Instituto de Telecomunicações, Lisbon.
She joined Infinera in 2015 working on the dimensioning of multi-layer optical
transport network. Her main research interests are multi-layer network design
and spectrum management algorithms.
Nelson Costa was born in Tomar, Portugal, in 1983. He received the Licenciatura
and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer engineering from the Instituto Su-
perior Técnico (IST), Lisbon Technical University, Lisbon, Portugal, in 2006 and
2012, respectively. He is currently with Infinera Portugal, Carnaxide, Portugal.
He has authored or coauthored more than 50 publications in international con-
ferences and journals. His current research interests include advanced coherent
optical modulation formats, nonlinear fiber transmission effects, and network
optimization.
Joao Pedro received the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer
engineering from Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), University of Lisbon, Lisbon,
Portugal. He was a Research Engineer and a System Architect for network
planning tools with Nokia Siemens Networks from 2008 to 2013 and Coriant
from 2013 to 2016. He is currently with Coriant Portugal (Infinera), where
he leads the Multilayer Performance Optimization team, which investigates
future-looking optical and multi-layer network architecture and design algo-
rithms and also supports both algorithmic development and optical performance
for planning tools and SDN controller. He holds six patent applications and has
coauthored more than 180 publications in international conferences and journals,
participated in EU projects FUTON, IDEALIST, and Metro-Haul and was a
Reviewer of IEEE/OSA JOURNAL OF CLINICAL NEUROSCIENCE, JOURNAL OF
LIGHTWAVE TECHNOLOGY, and IEEE PHOTONICS TECHNOLOGY LETTERS and
was a TPC member of OFC from 2015 to 2018. He has also been a Lecturer
of courses on network planning and transport networks. His research interests
include high capacity and flexible optical networks, node architectures, routing
and spectrum assignment, multilayer optimization, disaggregated networks, and
machine learning applications.
LOPEZ et al.: OPTIMIZED DESIGN AND CHALLENGES FOR C&L BAND OPTICAL LINE SYSTEMS 1091

Xian Xu received the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer
engineering from McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada, in 2010 and 2016,
respectively. From 2008 to 2014, he was a Research Assistant with Photonics
Group, McGill University, involved in the research on advanced equalization
and pulse shaping techniques for ultra-high bit rate coherent optical transmis-
sion systems. He is currently a Staff Optical Systems Engineer with Infinera
Corporation, Sunnyvale, CA, USA. He has authored and coauthored more than
50 peer-reviewed journal and conference papers. He was a recipient of the Fonds
Québécois de la Recherche sur la Nature et les Technologies Doctoral Research
Award from Province of Québec, Canada, in 2011.
Ales Kumpera received the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering
and information technology from Czech Technical University, Prague, Czechia,
in 2006 and 2010, respectively. He was a Postdoctoral Research Fellow with the
Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden, from 2012 to 2015.
He is currently with the Optical Systems Group, Infinera Canada, Kanata, ON,
Canada. His research interests include coherent technology and optical nonlinear
effects.
Jeff Rahn received the B.Sc. degree in physics from Stanford University, Palo
Alto, CA, USA, in 1991, and the Ph.D. degree from the University of California,
Santa Cruz, CA, USA, in 1998. His thesis, performed at Deutsche Electronen
Synchrotron, Hamburg, Germany, was focused on the internal structure of the
proton. In 1998, his research focused on X-ray detectors at Xerox’s Palo Alto
Research Center. In 2001, he joined Big Bear Networks, developing electronic
dispersion compensation ASICs for 10-GB/s receivers running over single mode
and multimode fibers. In 2005, Big Bear was acquired by Infinera. During
his time at Infinera, he defined optical architecture for several generations
of long-haul networking gear, specifically the optical and signal processing
framework and integration. Since 2019, he has been with Facebook, defining
the architecture for their datacenter and long-haul networks.
He has more than 50 journal and conference publications, and has been
awarded 29 patents.

Lee Dardis received the B.Sc. degree in applied physics with electronics from
Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland, in 1995, and the M.Sc. degree in applied
physics from the Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland, in 1998. In his more
than 20 years of experience in the fiber optics industry, he has worked for Alcatel
Submarine Networks and Nortel Networks designing optical amplifiers for ultra-
long haul submarine and terrestrial applications. In 2000, he joined Big Bear
Networks, where he worked on both the 40 G and 10 G X2 LRM module
development. In 2005, after the acquisition of Big Bear Networks by Finisar,
he helped transfer and sustain the former Big Bear Networks product lines. He
moved to Stratalight in 2007 and helped develop their 40 G VSR module. After a Steve Sanders received the Ph.D. degree in applied physics from the California
merger with Opnext and subsequently an acquisition by Oclaro, he went on to be Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA. He holds more than 35 US patents
a Principal Engineer in their 100 G development. In 2013, he joined Lumentum and currently leads the Optical Architecture Group, Infinera, Sunnyvale, CA.
and worked on early silicon photonics technology demonstrators. Since 2014, he His research interests include diode laser technology, high-power rare-earth
has been a Principal Optical Engineer with Infinera working on next generation doped fiber lasers and amplifiers, Raman amplification, and optical network
coherent systems. architecture.