JANET is the first National Research and Education Network in the world to successfully complete a 100Gbit/s network trial. The trial was conducted over a 103 km section of fibre between JANET core network points of presence (PoPs) in London and Reading during April 2009. The fibre infrastructure and facilities were provided by Verizon Business, the supplier and operator of JANET's UK backbone network, with Nortel providing the 100Gbit/s optical technology and test equipment.

JANET(UK) recently completed a major upgrade of its national UK backbone network to 40Gbit/s. Jeremy Sharp, head of Strategic Technologies at JANET(UK), commented that "Whilst introducing 40Gbit/s technology was an important move that will support traffic growth over the next few years, it's envisaged that 100Gbit/s circuits may be required within the next two to three years in the busiest parts of the network. This trial is an important preparatory step towards doing this, and we are pleased to have worked with our industry partners to achieve this."

The Nortel 40G/100G Adaptive Optical Engine technology used in the JANET trial is unique in that it automatically corrects for signal degradations due to fibre impairments that particularly manifest themselves at higher speeds of 40Gbit/s and 100Gbit/s. It is also designed to operate with compatible performance to today's 10Gbit/s networks while increasing capacity ten-fold. The solution requires no expensive network re-engineering and it can use existing assets including in-ground fibre.

"With the Nortel-supplied 40Gbit/s already in operation on major long distance routes, demonstrating the network's upgrade potential to 100Gbit/s and the ease with which it can be done shows how JANET can achieve a ten-fold increase in its network capacity without needing to lease and light new fibres," said Jamie Jefferies, (Leader Metro Ethernet Networks, EMEA), Nortel.

Verizon Business has worked closely with JANET(UK) for more than eight years supporting its objective of establishing an innovative means of sharing of ideas, data and learning across the UK-based academic community. Last year the company helped to deliver the ambitious 40Gbit/s upgrade programme, assuring that the JANET service remains a world-class infrastructure for UK education and research.

"Verizon Business is pleased to support JANET(UK) in undertaking this field trial of 100Gbit/s technology," said Michael Bauer, director of European network planning for Verizon Business. "For customers such as JANET, collaboration is critical, and so we are delighted to be able to bring our expertise to bear in support of the company's network goals."

The trial consisted of a combination of existing 10Gbit/s and 40Gbit/s test traffic with wavelengths set on either side of the 100Gbit/s traffic within a 50Ghz grid. External polarisation dispersion (pd has the effect of limiting fibre bandwidth) was added, exercised and demonstrated the extra performance that the coherent optical receiver in the Adaptive Optical Engine enables. Greater than 25ps dispersion was added, which resulted in error-free performance over the link.