Science and Engineering Council of Santa Barbara
December Luncheon
at
The Elephant Bar Restaurant
Thursday, December 8, 2005 12:00-1:30 PM

MEMS-Based Optical Switching:
Meeting the needs of Large-Scale Fiber

Optical networking is growing, and with it grow the challenges for large-scale optical networks. Large optical switches allow for reconfigurable optical networks, which are needed to support the ever-increasing bandwidth demands of voice, data, and video applications. Optical reconfiguration allows network resources to be used efficiently and provides for fast diagnosis and restoration of failed network capacity.

MEMS-based optical switching uses micro-electrical-mechanical (MEMS) mirrors. This is the only technology that has been developed that supports the switching of large number of optical fibers. Our speaker will describe low-loss 320-port optical switches, and future applications that will require switching up to thousands of fiber ports.

------PRESENTER------

Dr. Roger Helkey
Vice President of Research at Calient Networks

Dr. Roger Helkey is Vice President of Research at Calient Networks, where he leads projects including the 320-port core photonic switch. He was the first employee hired after the founding of Calient, and managed the successful and on-schedule introduction and release of a new optical switching technology. Prior to Calient, he has worked for the MIT Lincoln Laboratory, the University of Tokyo, Watkins-Johnson, and Trimble Navication. His work has involved the study of microcavity effects in optical switching and the development of analog photonic links, microwave integrated circuits, GPS processors, and a number of other filters, integrated circuits and other systems.

Dr. Helkey has an M.S. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering from UCSB, where his graduate work was on modelocked semiconductor lasers. His undergraduate degree in engineering is from CalTech. He has authored 40 journal papers, participated in the creation of three books, and holds 30 patents.

------OTHER INFO------

$14 for SEC members; $19 for non-members.
Information: Barbara Keaney (E-mail: scieng@silcom.com or call 805-684-4927).
Reservations NOT required.
Elephant Bar Restaurant: 521 Firestone Road.
Website: http://www.scieng.org

From the President: SEC is pleased to welcome Warner "Jack" Van Spanckeren of Santa Barbara to Individual membership. Please join us in December to hear this month's luncheon program which deals with optical networking technology andpromises to be very interesting. It will be followed next month by a discussion of the local job market by our Membership Chairman, Gary Kravetz. Gary's talks are always very popular, so come early to get a good seat. Annual membership renewals will be mailed out shortly, and we are pleased to say that we have "held the line" and kept our dues the same again this year. When you send in your renewal, please also consider making a donation to our scholarship.

Tim Murphy