About

The research of optical networks is evolving by leaps and bounds due to the exponential progress of network traffic, the appearance of next-generation services, and the limitations of the existing technologies. Due to the availability of significant high bandwidth in optical fiber, the recent forecast suggests that the optical communication system and networking market will significantly grow towards a billion-dollar size industry. Therefore it is crucial to investigate the building blocks for next-generation optical networks and develop a long-term efficient end-to-end solution. This workshop focuses on capturing various aspects in this context where several veterans from Industry and academia will share their valuable inputs. We believe this workshop will help the attendees understand the architecture of the future optical network and its associated cross-layer areas like network management, planning, security, etc.

Audience: This workshop is targeted toward students, researchers and industry professionals interested in the research of optical networks.

Organizers

Dr. Abhijit Mitra (Host)

Research Interests - Elastic Optical Networks, Passive Optical Networks -Access Networks, Visual Light Communication, Free Space Optics, Quantum Key Distribution over fiber.

Bio - Abhijit Mitra is presently working as a DST Inspire Faculty in Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering, IIIT Delhi. He received his PhD from the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi (2017) and his Master of Science (Engineering) from the University of Leeds, UK(2011). As a PhD student and BT Research Fellow at IIT Delhi, he demonstrated the benefits of operating optical networks with reduced Link Margin. Due to his research contributions and fostering strong research collaboration between India and the UK, he has been awarded the Professional Achievement Award-2019 by the British Council. Considering his research contributions, the United States India Education Foundation awarded him the Nehru-Fulbright Postdoctoral Research Fellowship (2019) at University of California Davis, USA. As a Postdoctoral researcher he evaluated the benefits of operating optical networks over C+L Bands for large geographies like the USA and India. He has published in prestigious venues like Proceedings of IEEE, JLT, JOCN, OFC, and ECOC. His current research focuses on Multi-band Optical Networks, Visible Light Communication and Quantum Key Distribution. He is currently leading funded projects by DST, MIETY and DRDO in the capacity of PI/Co-PI.

Prof. Anand Srivastava

Research Interests - Digital Communications, Wireless and Optical communications, Optical Networks.

Bio - Anand Srivastava did his M.Tech. and Ph.D. from IIT Delhi. Before joining IIIT Delhi, he was Dean & Professor in School of Computing and Electrical Engineering at Indian Institute of Technology Mandi, HP, India and also Adjunct Professor at IIT Delhi. Prior to this, he was with Alcatel-Lucent-Bell Labs, India as solution architect for access and core networks. Before joining Alcatel Lucent, he had a long stint (∼ 20 years) with Center for Development of Telematics (CDOT), a telecom research center of Govt. of India where he was Director and member of CDOT Board. He was also closely involved with ITU-T, Geneva in Study Group 15 and represented India for various optical networking standards meetings. His research work is in the area of optical core & access networks, Fiber-Wireless (FiWi) architectures, optical signal processing, free space optical communications and energy aware optical networks.

Dr. Vivek Ashok Bohara

Research Interests - Device-to-device communication, Visible Light Communication, Hybrid VLC-RF architecture, Proof-of-concept testbeds and experimental validation.

Bio - Vivek Ashok Bohara got his PhD in electrical and electronics engineering from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore in 2011. Currently, he is working as an Associate Professor at IIIT-Delhi. His research interests include cognitive radio, cooperative communication and designing digital predistortion algorithms for wideband power amplifiers. During his doctoral research at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore he designed and implemented a prototype WiFi module (IEEE 802.11a) and mobile WiMAX system (IEEE 802.16e) on reconfigurable NI modular instruments as well as on Lyrtech SFF software defined radio platform. For his work on Mobile WiMAX he has awarded 1st prize on 2010 National Instruments ASEAN Virtual Instrumentation application contest. During his tenure as a Post-Doctoral researcher (Marie Curie Fellowship) in ESIEE Paris, University Paris-East, he was actively involved in designing and implementing critical blocks for cognitive radio (CR) transmitters.

Student Coordinators

Rana Kumar Jana (Website)

Rahul (Memento)

Agenda

Session 1: Simplification of Optical Network Architecture Considering Future Generation Services.
Summary: The upcoming era of sixth-generation (6G) wireless networks will introduce many new services and applications where ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC) will be the key requirement. In order to support these next-generation front-end wireless networks, the optical backbone networks will significantly evolve over the next ten years of time frame. The network industry operators have already started focusing on co-packaged optical solutions to build power and cost-effective solutions. In addition, optical signal processing has also become a new solution in order to cope with the saturation of Moore’s Law. Furthermore, the fiber capacity is also needed to be upgraded beyond the C band for supporting bandwidth-hungry ultra-reliable applications. Therefore it is expected that a range of innovations will take place in optical network architecture in the upcoming decade, and that will open several research directions.
Session 2: The Role of Artificial Intelligence in Network Management and Planning.
Summary: Recently, the performance improvement of the communication networks with the help of artificial intelligence (AI)-based automated techniques has become an area of extensive research both in Industry and academia. In the context of core optical networks, AI-assisted techniques have already shown significant advantages in several fields, such as resource allocation, quality of transmission estimation, traffic prediction, etc. In addition, the existing radio access networks (RAN) systems are going towards a software-driven, virtualized, open architecture where the role of AI will be unavoidable. AI can help to build the radio intelligent controller (RIC) and smart interfaces in open-RAN architecture. Furthermore, in the context of software-defined networking (SDN) and network function virtualization (NFV)-based metro networks, the AI-assisted control plane can help to make strategic decisions during network planning. Therefore, it will be more interesting to investigate the ability of AI to find the suboptimal or optical solutions to highly complex network planning, management, and control problems, which is necessary to ensure the seamless interaction between access, metro, and core networks in the upcoming era of automation based beyond 5G (B5G) communications.
Session 3: Security in Optical Networks.
Summary: One of the key visions of 6G networks is to enhance the security of the network where confidential data faces security threads such as eavesdropping and jamming. In general, the end-to-end security of the network depends on several factors such as physical layer security, network layer security, IP-layer security, etc. Classically, the conventional cryptographic methods are focused on the complex mathematical model in order to ensure end-to-end service security. Recently, quantum key distribution (QKD) has become an efficient choice in order to model secure optical networks where secure keys are distributed at the transmitter and receiver ends. However, the research challenge appears for the integration of this quantum communication with the existing classical optical networks. Therefore, several investigations need to be done in order to solve several open research problems, such as routing and wavelength assignment, trusted repeater node placement, etc., in the QKD-based secure communication system.

Schedule

Free Registration

Registrations are free but mandatory to receive the zoom link of the workshop. Link will be emailed separately after registration, 2-3 days before the day of the workshop. Those who want to attend the Workshop in-person can do so at A-007 R&D Building, IIIT Delhi

Register Here

Keynote Speakers

Prof. Biswanath Mukherjee (IEEE Fellow, University of California Davis, USA)

Title of the Talk: Optical Performance Analytics

Short Bio: Biswanath (Bis) Mukherjee is Distinguished Professor Emeritus at University of California, where he has been since 1987. He is also Founder and President of Ennetix, Inc., a leading provider of AI-powered performance and security analytics for IT infrastructures. He has graduated 80 PhDs to date. He received his B.Tech. (Hons) degree from IIT Kharagpur (1980) and PhD from University of Washington, Seattle (1987). He is a Fellow of the IEEE.

Andrew Lord (Senior Manager and Head of Optics Research, BT)

Title of the Talk: New Directions for Optical Communications

Short Bio: Andrew joined BT in 1985 after a BA in Physics from Oxford University. He has helped design a wide range of optical network systems and technologies, including long haul subsea and terrestrial DWDM networks. He has been responsible for optical fibre and systems specifications. He currently leads BT’s optical research including optical access, high speed transmission and quantum communications. He has recently initiated BT’s quantum research, with applications in areas such as secure communications, timing and sensing. He regularly speaks at conferences, sits on several organising committees, including ECOC and was Technical Program Chair for OFC 2015 and General Chair for OFC 2017. He will be TPC co-chair of ECOC 2023. He is Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Optical Communications and Networking, He is Visiting Professor at Essex University, Senior Member of the IEEE and a BT Distinguished Engineer.

Session Speakers

Dr. Arvind Kumar Mishra (Assistant General Manager, Sterlite)

Title of the Talk: Optical Fiber Solutions for Next Generation Optical Networks

Short Bio: Dr. Arvind Kumar Mishra is working with Sterlite Technologies Limited as Head of Optical Physics and System Engineering. He has received M. Sc. and M. Tech. degrees from IIT Delhi and PhD degree from University College Cork (UCC), Ireland. He possesses 20+ years of advance research experience and driving cutting edge research on Tera-scale transport systems for NLD/Metro & GPON/NG-PON Access Networks, Fiber Optic Sensor Technologies and Systems for Security & Smart Infrastructure. He has published over 60 articles in peer reviewed International Journals and Conferences. He has served as President, Vice-President and Board of Directors at FTTH Council Asia-Pacific.

Mr. Satish Jamadagni (Vice President and Head of Standards, Reliance Jio)

Title of the Talk: Moving from 5G to 6G: Architectural needs and optical technologies for access and backhaul

Short Bio: Satish Jamadagni is currently the Vice President and head of standards in Reliance Jio. He has 23 years of industry experience in the telecom domain. He is also current the Vice Chair of TSDSI which is the Indian Standards Development Organization (SDO). He is active in 3GPP, GSMA and in O-RAN alliance. Earlier he was a Co-Chair of the Asia Regional Operators Group; Small Cell Forum (SCF) and was on the board of the International Multimedia Teleconferencing Consortium (IMTC). He has around 200 granted patents in the wireless and network domain.

Mr. Chandan Kumar (Head of Optical Network Business Center, Nokia)

Title of the Talk: Evolution of Optical Transport Networks for 5G and beyond

Short Bio: A seasoned and dynamic ICT professional with 27 years of work experience in various domains such as Business Development, Marketing, Corporate affairs, Pre-sales management and Network Consulting. An Engineering graduate in electronics with Post Graduate diploma in operations management, Chandan have handled various leadership roles such as head of marketing, head of Public affairs & corporate communications, head of Business & Network Consulting etc. Chandan has been directing business development, sales, revenue administration, and industry-leading customer service efforts with companies including Nokia Networks, Huawei, Nortel Networks, HFCL. Chandan has several contributions towards development of broadband in India and have closely worked with Department of Telecommunications, Telecom regulatory authority of India, telecom service providers and equipment vendors for same.

Mr. Nikhilesh Mehta (Software Engineer, Cisco)

Title of the Talk: Applications of AI/ML in the embedded optical systems

Short Bio: Currently, I am working in CISCO Systems Bangalore in the Mass Scale Infrastructure (MIG) group as an Optical test lead from last 2.5 years. Before joining CISCO, I worked in Infinera for 5 years. I have done M.Tech in “Opto-Electronics and Optical Communication” from IIT Delhi in 2012. Currently I am also pursuing executive MBA (EPGC) in AI&ML from IIM Kozhikode. I was a Research scholar for one year in TU Eindhoven in 2013. My current activities in CISCO includes testing and validating the next generation optical line system (NCS1010), which will be the backbone for the Routed Optical Network (RON) architecture. My interests are exploring the AI & ML applications in Optical Systems to make it more efficient.

Prof. Darko Zibar (DTU, Denmark)

Title of the Talk: Next Generation of Optical Amplifiers

Short Bio: Darko Zibar is Professor at the Department of Photonics Engineering, Technical University of Denmark and the group leader of Machine Learning in Photonics Systems (M-LiPS) group. He received M.Sc. degree in telecommunication and the Ph.D. degree in optical communications from the Technical University of Denmark, in 2004 and 2007, respectively. He has been on several occasions (2006, 2008 and 2019) visiting researcher with the Optoelectronic Research Group led by Prof. John E. Bowers at the University of California, Santa Barbara, (UCSB). At UCSB, he has been working on topics ranging from analog and digital demodulation techniques for microwave photonics links and machine learning enabled ultra-sensitive laser phase noise measurements techniques. In 2009, he was a visiting researcher with Nokia-Siemens Networks, working on clock recovery techniques for 112 Gb/s polarization multiplexed optical communication systems. In 2018, he was visiting Professor with Optical Communication (Prof. Andrea Carena, OptCom) group, Dipartimento di Elettronica e Telecomunicazioni, Politecnico di Torino working on the topic of machine learning based Raman amplifier design. His research efforts are currently focused on the application of machine learning techniques to advance classical and quantum optical communication and measurement systems. Some of his major scientific contributions include: record capacity hybrid optical-wireless link (2011), record sensitive optical phase noise measurement technique that approaches the quantum limit (2019) and design of ultra wideband arbitrary gain Raman amplifier (2019). He is a recipient of Best Student paper award at Microwave Photonics Conference (2006), Villum Young Investigator Programme (2012), Young Researcher Award by University of Erlangen-Nurnberg (2016) and European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator Grant (2017). Finally, he was a part of the team that won the HORIZON 2020 prize for breaking the optical transmission barriers (2016).

Prof. Massimo Tornatore (Politecnico di Milano, Italy)

Title of the Talk: Machine Learning for Low-Margin Routing and Spectrum Assignment in Optical Networks

Short Bio: Massimo Tornatore is currently an Associate Professor with the Department of Electronics, Information, and Bioengineering, Politecnico di Milano. He also holds an appointment as Adjunct Professor at University of California, Davis, USA and as visiting professor at University of Waterloo, Canada. His research interests include performance evaluation, optimization and design of communication networks (with an emphasis on the application of optical networking technologies), network virtualization, network reliability and machine learning application for network management. In these areas, he co-authored more than 400 peer-reviewed conference and journal papers (with 19 best paper awards), 2 books and 1 patent. He is a member of the Editorial Board of IEEE Communication Surveys and Tutorials, IEEE Communication Letters, IEEE Transactions on Network and Service Management, and Elsevier Optical Switching and Networking.

Prof. Anil Prabhakar (IIT Madras)

Title of the Talk: Securing Metro Area Networks with Quantum Technology

Short Bio: Prof. Anil Prabhakar received his PhD in 1997 from Carnegie Mellon University, with a dissertation on the Nonlinear Spin-wave Optical Interactions. He has been with the faculty at the Dept. of Electrical Engineering, IIT-Madras since 2002, and is engaged across multiple laboratories that work on quantum optics, lasers and opto-fluidics. As an academic-entreprenuer he has incubated Unilumen Photonics, QuNu Labs, Yali Mobility, Enability Foundation and Quanfluence. He is a member of the Scientific Management Board for LIGO-India, and currently serves on the Editorial Boards for Scientific Reports (Nature), the IEEE Transactions on Magnetics and as India's representative to the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics Commission on Magnetism.

Mr. Dilip Singh (Chief Product Officer, QNu Labs)

Title of the Talk: Quantum Secure Optical Networks using principles of Quantum Physics

Short Bio: Dilip Singh is the Chief Product and Technology Officer at QNu Labs, responsible for Innovation and Engineering at QNu Labs. QNu Labs is a leader in quantum safe cryptography products and solutions, offering unconditional and forward security of data on the internet & cloud and amongst the top companies in the world having commercially ready to deploy products and solutions. Dilip has over 30 years of experience in the digital product engineering space across Telecom, Media Platform, Industrial IOT, Datacom and Defence Electronics. He has been part of multiple successful product conceptualization ,design and delivery across his career in Bharat Electronics, Hughes Software Systems ( now part of Capgemini), Cognizant, GlobalLogic and QNu Labs. Dilip holds a Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics and Communications from IIT-Roorkee and is closely associated with Standardization of Quantum Secure Communications products & deployments in India and collaboration with international community.

Prof. G. Raghavan (Director of School of Quantum Technology, DIAT, Pune)

Title of the Talk: Practical challenges of integrating Quantum resources into optical communication networks

Short Bio: Prof. G. Raghavan is trained at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre in Physics and completed his Ph.D. from the Indian Institute of Science. He has three decades of research experience in the Department of Atomic energy in condensed matter physics, surface and interface physics, semiconductor physics, ultrafast spectroscopy, ion implantation, theoretical physics, experimental and theoretical quantum optics, and quantum information. He completed his post-doctoral work on semiconductor devices and related areas in Germany. Presently, he is the professor and director of the School of Quantum Technology at the Defence Institute of Advanced Technology.

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