The expansion of broadband communication and multichannel digital television broadcasting has intensified the demand for high-speed networks. The routers, switches, and other networking technologies currently available do not function well at higher speeds. One solution is the optical packet network, a system in which data is transmitted over fiber optic lines as pulses of light.
It will be several years before the first of these networks is available, but Yokogawa® Electric Corporation has already developed two key optical network components. One is an ultra-high-speed optical switching device that helps prevent bottlenecks by enabling signals in optical circuits to be switched from one circuit to another. The other is an optical packet transmitter/receiver, known as Optical Media Manager, that provides an interface between the optical packet network and conventional networks.
Using MathWorks products and Model-Based Design, Yokogawa Electric reduced development time and costs by thoroughly testing these devices before prototyping them.
"End-to-end system development with Simulink® has streamlined our current design flow," says Yokogawa development team manager Chie Sato. "We found virtually all bugs before hardware prototyping using Simulink and Mentor Graphics® ModelSim®, and this cut development time in half."