DWDM
Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing
The development of erbium doped fibre amplifiers has allowed channel spacing of 0.8nm in the 1550nm range. This enables many more wavelengths to be multiplexed onto a single fibre. In simple terms, DWDM systems shine different colours of light down the optical fibre, with each colour or wavelength capable of conveying a separate datastream. Therefore, a DWDM system with 200 channels would be capable of carrying 200 times the amount of data than a single wavelength fibre.