ISSN : 2230-7109 (Online) | ISSN : 2230-9543 (Print) IJECT Vol.

6, Issue 4, Oct - Dec 2015

Passive Optical Network: A Review

1
Pankhuri Dogra, 2Mandeep Kaur
1,2
Rayat Bahra University, Mohali, Punjab, India

Abstract being considered as a way of delivering broadband services to

The main objective of this paper is to know about Passive Optical customers. These early system was predicted on multimode fibre
Network.It is a type of network based on Optical Fibre. Passive technology. The first consideration of Passive Optical Network
optical network is used for reliability and high data rate. This approach for the access network was around 1982 when single
network enables the service providers to get the unlimited virtual mode fibre technology was being seen as a possible new way
bandwidth for transmitting video, audio and data simultaneously. for a forward optical communications. Single mode fiber offered
In this paper we shall study about evolution, architecture, many advantages as compared to multimode fiber ork concept.
technologies, advantages and disadvantages of passive optical In the first half of the 1980s the passive optical network concept
network. was centred on wavelength switched networks. To interconnect
network terminations and wavelength selection to route path [10]
Keywords across the network star couplers are used. At the same time ideas
PON, ONU, FSAN, OLT, APON, BPON, GPON, EPON of using the couplers as simple passive splitters for broadcasting
television signal were also being considered [11]. In the mid1980s
I. Introduction BT (British Telecom) became interested in the possibilities
Most of the broadband services around the world are delivered presented by optical access and this led to a refocusing of passive
through the copper access network, optical access technology optical network approach. The operational unit brought a much
has been commercially available for several years and is being needed business focus to the research and challenged the research
deployed in large amount in some countries [3]. The rapid growth team to develop a system that could be economical for telephony.
in both use and size of computer networks has arouse a new This was a service with a known revenue structures opposed
interest for increasing the networks capabilities to transport more to the unknown revenues from future broadband services. This
traffic with higher speed. Over recent years optical communication approach became known as “telephony entry strategy” and led to
networks have been deployed widely across the globe. With invention and development of “TPON” (telephony over passive
excessive bandwidth offerings of optical networks in metropolitan optical network) system [9- 8]. TPON was TDM based and the
and wide area networks (WANs), there still exists a restricted early system had a limited bandwidth of 20 Mbit/s, adequate for
access between Local Area Networks (LANs) and the service telephony and ISDN but not for broadband. Broadband would be
provider’s networks. This has a reflective impact on the design of added later, as an upgrade, by addition of extra wavelengths. To
next-generation optical network architectures and technologies. facilitates this a blocking filter was supplementary to the TPON
Optical fibres are widely used in telecommunications, since they ONUs, which only pass the original TPON wavelength and block
allow sending large amounts of data at a great distance and having all others, enabling addition wavelengths to be supplementary to
higher bandwidths (data rates) than other forms of communication. the PON at a later stage without troubling the original telephony
They are the transmission medium par excellence to be immune to only customers. However, the system was never rolled out on
electromagnetic interference and because signals travel along them any important scale the upgrade system (called BPON at the
with less losses. This transmission mode allows the transport of a time) was never developed into a commercial product. At the
multitude of information, used for applications such as broadband end of the eighties BT was developing an ATM version of
Internet, telephone and cable television, through more effective Passive Optical Network called APON. Also around this time
signals than copper wires. There are two major set of fibre-based optical amplifiers were emerging as a network component. At the
technologies to be deployed in the access networks. One is active end of eighties and early nineties numerous experiments were
optical networks and other is Passive Optical Networks (PONs). performed at BT Labs that confirmed the real potential of passive
The former depends on active components in the subscriber loop optical networking approach and culminate in the publication of
(from CO to users) and in PON, there is no active device in the initially a 32 millionway split network delivering 12 wavelength
signals path between CO and subscribers. High capacity feature at 2.5 Gbit/s each [9]. During the early nineties BT continued
of multi-access optical networks with comparison to other access with the design and development of a practical amplified PON
network technologies like cable, DSL and wireless access is the architecture, it became dubbed as Super PON. This examined
main motive of passive optical network exploitation [4]. the design and execution option of a passive optical network that
could service a split of up to 3000 and have a geographical range
II. Evolution of PON up to 100 km. The capacity was 1.2 Gbit/s downstream and 300
Fiber-to-home and -business was a consideration from the earliest Mbit/s upstream. At the time these bit rates were very striving
days of the optical fiber technology development. In the late for optical access and were considered to be the limits for low
1970s point- to- point substitution of copper by the fibre was costs customers equipment. In the mid nineties BT, Deutsche
being considered as a way of delivering broadband services to Telekom and NTT decided, with other operators, to set up a
customers. For the future evolution of the optical networking high consortium to enlarge and standardized PON requirements and
performance mode fibre optical components should be made. systems , this discussion became FSAN [7]. In recent years,
One component that became available easily with the arrival of PON systems have continued to be developed, largely along
single mode technology was the fused fibre directional coupler. FSAN (Full Service Access Network) guidelines and mainly in
These splitter or couplers can be cascaded and any size of splitter the small/start up company arena. More recently Japan, Korea
or star couplers can be made. These optical splitters were the and the US have re-energized interest in the supply industry and
major components behind the passive optical netw fiber was PON access solutions are once becoming the access solution of

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IJECT Vol. 6, Issue 4, Oct - Dec 2015 ISSN : 2230-7109 (Online) | ISSN : 2230-9543 (Print)

choice as FTTH (Fibre To The Home) deployment progresses optical and electrical worlds, i.e. the routing and transport from
into 21st century. optics and buffering and processing from electronics.

III. Passive Optical Networks IV. PON Technologies

The Passive Optical Network is one of the most extensively There are four type of PON-based technologies namely Broad
deployed access networks due to its exclusive benefits, including band PON (BPON), Ethernet PON (EPON), Gigabit PON
transparency against data rate and signal format as well as high data (GPON), APON.
rates and reliability [2]. The PON is type of access network which
based on Optical Fibre. It is designed to make available unlimited A. APON
bandwidth to the subscriber. A Passive Optical Network uses a It was the first network that was defined by FSAN (Full Service
passive optical splitter to divide the signal towards individual Access Network). APON bases its transmission downlink in bursts
subscriber. of cells ATM (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) with a maximum rate
Fig. 1 depicts a common PON architecture supporting different of 155 Mbps shared between the ONT numbers that are connected.
FTTx scenario. Only passive components are used as optical Its initial problem was the imitation of 155 Mbps which later
elements in such networks, such as fibres, splitters/couplers was increased to 622 Mbps. In each ATM cell is introducing two
optical path that consists of these components is called Optical more cells, responsible of indicate the addressee of each cell and
Distribution Network (ODN). The Optical Line Terminal (OLT) for maintenance. These networks are referred to as APON (ATM
resides in CO (Central Office) and connects the optical access Passive Optical Network), and are standardized under ITU-T
network to an IP, ATM, or SONET backbone. An Optical Network standard G.983.1.
Unit (ONU) is placed at the curb or Optical Network Terminal
(ONT) is located at end user location (FTTH, FTTB solution) and B. BPON
to provide broadband voice, data and video services with surely The Broadband passive optical network (BPON) was the first
reaching all the way to customer premises, FTTC may be the effort towards a PON standard. It is governed by the ITU-T and
most inexpensive deployment today leaving room for alternatives is designated as ITU-T G.983. It established the general needs
technologies such as DSL or even wireless to implement the last for PON protocols. BPON use Asynchronous Transfer Mode
drop. (ATM) as the underlying transport mechanism to carry used data.
BPON did not gain much popularity due to lack of bandwidth and
extensive use of Ethernet protocol.

C. EPON
The Ethernet passive optical network (EPON/GE-PON) is
governed by IEEE and is designated as IEEE 802.3ah. EPON
is based on Ethernet, unlike other PON technologies which are
based on ATM. It provides simple, easy-to-manage connectivity
to Ethernet-based IP equipment both at the customer premises and
at central office. It is well suitable to carry packetized traffic as
well as time-sensitive voice and video traffic. It offers 1.25Gbps
Fig. 1: PON Architecture [2] data rate for both upstream and downstream. EPON supports 1:16
split ratio i.e. 16 ONUs at a range of 20 km can be connected with
All transmission over the ODN of the PON starts from or towards a single port of OLT.
the OLT, as ONUs or OLTs do not communicate directly with
each other. The P2MP transmission from the OLT to ONUs/ D. GPON
ONTs is called downstream and the P2MP transmission from The most recent PON standard is the ITU-T G.984 GPON(Gigabit
the ONUs to OLT is called upstream transmissionThe upstream PON) standard, which offers 2.488 Gbps bandwidth and direct
and downstream are carried on the same fibre. To understand support of both TDM(POTs & E1) and Ethernet traffic at the
why FTTx architecture is based on PON network, it is necessary edge of the network with possible triple play voice, data and
to make a direct comparison between the point-to-point (P2P), video services on the same PON. GPON can support ONU that
passive point-to- multipoint (PON) and active point-to-multipoint is located as far as 30 Km from the OLT. GPON offer higher split
networks (AONhree types of network configuration cited above, ratio of 1:32/64/128 which results in an OLT reduction by more
that clearly defend the use of FTTx PON compared to other than a factor of 2 over EPON. GPON is a more advanced system
configurations. than EPON from the technological parameters point of view. It
provides higher bandwidth efficiency and higher splitting ratio
Due to passive interconnection of nodes, and shared medium among but generally costs more than EPON.
users, a multiple access scheme is required to avert collision. In all
networks, multiple access schemes are accomplished by resource V. Multiplexing PON Technology
sharing in either of space, the time, the frequency, or the code
domains. The four basic multiple access techniques that have been A. WDM PON
broadly investigated and applied to current optical fibre networks The wavelength division multiplexing passive optical network is
are comprised of, wavelength Division Multiple Access (WDMA), the next generation in the growth of access networks and offers
Subcarrier Multiple Access (SCMA), Time Division Multiple high bandwidth. In WDM PON architecture, ONUs operates on
access(TDMA) and Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) different wavelengths and hence higher broadcast rates can be
schemes [6]. Multiple access optical networks grasp best of both achieved. Much research has been resolute on increasing WDM

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ISSN : 2230-7109 (Online) | ISSN : 2230-9543 (Print) IJECT Vol. 6, Issue 4, Oct - Dec 2015

PONs ability to serve large numbers of customers in an attempt to causes a drop in network efficiency.
increase revenue from invested resource. As a result, some hybrid • The total capacity is divided into many ONT connected to the
structures have been planned where both WDMA and TDMA are splitter, so that the efficiency of the channel is lower than that
used to enhance the number of potential users. For DWDM, the of a point-to-multipoint link. In addition, because PON has
ONUs needs expensive, frequency stable, temperature controlled a preset speed, it is forced to work at that speed but offering
lasers. The OLT puts the entire wavelength on to the feeder fibre different speeds to the customer service. For example, an
and the splitter replicate the wavelength to each [5]. ONT that provides 100 Mbps to the customer is required to
work at higher speed rates: 1.25 Gbps or 2.5 Gbps.
VI. Comparative Analysis Among xPON Standards • Moreover, the fact that all information flow through the same
In the previous sections an analytical data of different standards physical channel increases the likelihood of sniffing on the
xPON standard has made. These data can be condensed and network, losing security, and forcing to establish a high level
completed in the table 1.2 of encryption.
• Regarding security, PON architecture is sensitive to external
VII. Advantages of PON sabotage. This problem is produced by the nature of the
Many of the PON properties are given by the use of fibre, and transmission medium itself. Injection of constant light to a
of course, of the passive elements that compose the network, particular wavelength masks all communication and service
which added to the specific configuration of a star or tree give it tends to fall.
certain advantages over other topologies. This gives to PON two • Another important aspect is the fact that a stage or distribution
undoubtedly important advantages: cost savings in implementation tree, depend exclusively on a single OLT. A fault in the OLT
and the capacity and bandwidth of passive optical networks. header produces a high affect on the network, since all the
However, these advantages are not the only ones, and among ONT and splitters connected to it are affected. However, the
other, the most relevant are listed below installation of few OLT provide a cost reduction of network
• A Passive Optical Network allows for longer distances deployment enough considerable.
communication between central offices and customer The ONTs of PON are quite sensitive to the level drops, and in
premises. While with the Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) many cases, the power budget of the network is quite limited.
the maximum distance between the central office and the This budget is directly related to:
customer is only 18000 feet (approximately 5.5 km), a PON • The capacity of splitters. When the number of users are large,
local loop can operate at distances of over 20 km [6]. less power reach from the OLT to each users.
• There is the possibility that every information source can • Maximum distance to achieve. The greater the distance
be provided in different wavelength, avoiding the mixing between the OLT and end users, lesser power will reach the
of signals to each other, and facilitating diffusion from the corresponding ONTs.
OLT to the different ONTs. Therefore, signals voice and data However, despite the disadvantages mentioned above, the most
are managed by so-called P-OLT, which operates in second advantageous configuration for the deployment of FTTx is PON.
window wavelengths, and video signals in diffusion are Two of the most important conditions that justify the use of this
managed by the so-called V-OLT, operating in third window architecture are:
wavelengths. This fact gives scalability to PON transmission • The economic savings obtained from deploying PON networks
system, given the variety of wavelengths to use for the same regarding other two configurations (point to point and active
by CWDM / DWDM. optical network).
• The use of passive elements in the network provide a cheaper • The flexibility of the network, which allows a large number
cost of implementation. On the one hand it diminishes the of user to use the channel.
cost of installation of active elements, and on the other hand
the cost of passive element itself, which is much lower. IX. Conclusion
• The installation of PON from these elements is much more This paper is a review of passive optical network. The passive
cost-effective, and prevents operation and maintenance optical network is one of the most extensively deployed access
costs, such as absence of falls or maintenance of the network networks due to its exclusive benefits, including transparency
feeds. against data rate and signal format as well as high data rates and
• Finally, it is notable that the high bandwidth allowed by reliability. It is designed to make available unlimited bandwidth
systems based on PON architectures which can reach the 10 to the subscriber.
Gbps rate down to the user. The need to increase the bandwidth
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IJECT Vol. 6, Issue 4, Oct - Dec 2015 ISSN : 2230-7109 (Online) | ISSN : 2230-9543 (Print)

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