W3H.3.

pdf OFC 2014 © OSA 2014

Flexible Virtual Network Provisioning over

Distance-Adaptive Flex-Grid Optical Networks
Xi Wang, Qiong Zhang, Inwoong Kim, Paparao Palacharla, Motoyoshi Sekiya
Fujitsu Laboratories of America, Inc., Richardson, TX, USA Email: Xi.Wang@us.fujitsu.com

Abstract: We present a flexible virtual optical network provisioning procedure for distance-adaptive
flex-grid optical networks. Simulations show ~3 times increase in effective network capacity by
leveraging the combined effect of flexible node mapping and distance-adaptive modulation.
OCIS codes: (060.4250) Networks; (060.1155) All-optical networks; (060.4256) Networks, network optimization

1. Introduction
Software Defined Networking (SDN) was initially focused on IP and Ethernet networks. SDN is now being introduced
to the agile optical networks built using colorless/directionless/flex-grid ROADMs and multiple modulation formats
programmable transponders [1]. A SDN-enabled optical network is called a Software-Defined Optical Network
(SDON), which is expected to be more open, programmable, and application aware. Although the exact definition and
features of SDON may vary among experts, one distinctive feature of SDON that is generally agreed upon is optical
network virtualization, which enables network service providers to provision multiple coexisting and isolated virtual
optical networks (VONs) over the same physical infrastructure. More specifically, in conventional optical networks,
network services are provided in terms of lightpaths. In contrast, in the SDON era, network services are provided in
terms of VONs.
VON provisioning is a leapfrog from conventional ligthpath provisioning in the following two aspects:
1) A lightpath is a point-to-point connection. On the other hand, a VON is a network with multiple virtual nodes
(vNodes) and virtual links (vLinks). Each vNode is mapped to a physical optical node. Each vLink is mapped to a
lightpath connecting the physical optical nodes associated with the vNodes. All lightpaths for a VON need to be
provisioned as a whole instead of individually, due to the fact that a VON demand can only be served when all vLinks
are successfully mapped to lightpaths.
2) A lightpath has fixed source and destination node. On the other hand, the vNode-to-physical node mapping in a
VON can be flexible. For example, a vNode may be mapped to any physical node within a certain geographic area or
among a certain number of specified physical nodes, as long as the resulting physical SDON slice satisfies the service-
level agreement of the VON. Such flexibility empowers the network service providers to optimize resource usage while
maintaining their service provisioning capability.
In essence, VON provisioning generalizes the concept of optical networking service, from point-to-point fixed-node-
pair lightpath provisioning, to multi-point flexible-nodes-group optical network slicing. Since a lightpath is a special
instance of a VON consisting of only two vNodes each with a fixed node mapping, the VON service provisioning
system used by a SDON service provider has backward-compatibility to traditional lightpath provisioning.
2. VON provisioning for distance-adaptive flex-grid optical networks
Various VON provisioning methods have been reported recently. Early research such as [2, 3] study virtual network
mapping for fixed-grid WDM optical networks, whose solutions are not applicable to flex-grid optical networks
employing distance-adaptive modulation. More recent studies [4-6] consider distance-adaptive modulation in elastic
optical networks. However, they either do not allow flexible vNode-to-physical node mapping [4], or they consider
distance-adaptive modulation-based path selection after the completion of vNode-to-physical node mapping [5, 6].
Since node mapping prior to path selection reduces the chance of finding potential paths with appropriate distances for
more spectrum-efficient modulation, these approaches cannot fully leverage the spectrum utilization efficiency brought
by distance-adaptive modulation. It remains uninvestigated as how much effective network capacity increase can be
expected from the combined effect of flexible node mapping and distance-adaptive modulation. In this paper, we
address this question through a flexible VON provisioning procedure that is applicable to distance-adaptive flex-grid
optical networks supporting flexible node mapping.
Fig. 1 is an illustrative example highlighting that joint consideration of flexible node mapping and distance-adaptive
modulation is essential to achieve efficient spectrum utilization. Fig. 1 (a) shows a VON demand and (b) shows the
physical infrastructure for mapping this VON demand. The VON demand consists of 3 vNodes (1, 2, and 3) and 3
vLinks (indicated in red, blue and green). The candidate physical nodes that each vNode can be mapped to are: vNode
1: A, E; vNode 2: B; vNode 3: C, D. The capacity requirement of all vLinks is 400 Gbps. Based on the combinations of
vNode-to-candidate physical node mapping choices, the right side of Fig 1 show 4 potential Mapping Patterns (MPs):
MP1: {(1, A), (2, B), (3, C)}; MP2: {(1, A), (2, B), (3, D)}; MP3: {(1, E), (2, B), (3, C)}; MP4: {(1, E), (2, B), (3, D)}.

978-1-55752-993-0/14/$31.00 ©2014 Optical Society of America

 W3H.3.pdf OFC 2014 © OSA 2014

Assume that the network supports 2 modulation formats for 400 Gbps: Format A occupies 1 slot with 400km reach;
format B occupies 2 slots with 600km reach. Accordingly, the total numbers of slots required by each MP are: MP1:
2+2+2+1+1=8; MP2: 1+1+1+1=4; MP3: 2+2+2+2+1=9; MP4: 2+2+1+1=6. As illustrated by this example, different
MPs may result in vastly different slot usage due to the combined effect of flexible node mapping and distance-adaptive
modulation. In this example, the most inefficient Mapping Pattern 3 uses more than twice the slots than the most
efficient Mapping Pattern 2!
Candidates: Candidates: 200 200
E D E D
A E C D A A 3
1 3 1 1
C C
Candidates: 3
B
2
B B
(a) A VON Demand 2 2
Mapping Pattern 1: 8 slots Mapping Pattern 2: 4 slots

200 200 200

E D E D E D
A A 1 A 1 3
C C C
3
B B B
2 2
(b) Physical Infrastructure (link distance in km) Mapping Pattern 3: 9 slots Mapping Pattern 4: 6 slots
Fig.1. Illustrative example of flexible VON provisioning: different mapping patterns result in vastly different slot usage.

3. Flexible VON provisioning procedure

Our flexible VON provisioning procedure aims at maximizing spectrum utilization efficiency by jointly considering the
flexible node mapping and distance-adaptive modulation. It uses Mapping Patterns (MPs) to represent the potential
optical network slicing patterns for a given VON demand. All candidate MPs are evaluated and compared in terms of
spectrum slot assignment and usage. Finally, the VON is provisioned according to the best choice of MP. The detailed
procedure of flexible VON provisioning is as follows:
1) For each VON demand, the Mapping Pattern Computation Engine (MPCE) calculates all candidate MPs based on
the combinations of vNode-to-candidate physical node mapping choices with associated resource requirements and
constraints. Each MP consists of a list of one-to-one mapping relationship between every vNode and physical node,
as exemplified in Section 2. In addition, each MP includes a list of point-to-point lightpath demands generated from
the current node mapping list and the VON demand’s vLink list.
2) For each candidate MP, the SDON controller performs distance-adaptive routing and spectrum slot assignment trial
for all of its point-to-point lightpath demands. For simplicity, we adopt shortest path routing and first-fit slot
assignment in this study, although other routing and slot assignment schemes can also be used. If all lightpath
demands can be served under the current network condition, this MP is added to the valid MPs list.
3) If there are one or more MPs in the final valid MPs list, this VON demand can be served. Among all valid MPs, the
SDON controller selects the MP that occupies the lowest slot layer (the slot layer of a MP is defined as the highest
slot ID among all spectrum slots assigned to the MP). If there are multiple such valid MPs, choose the MP that has
the smallest overall slot usage (obtained from adding up all slots assigned to the MP). The rationale behind this
selection process is as follows: choosing the MP occupying the lowest possible slot layer helps minimize slot
fragmentation and allows for more common usable slots across the network; choosing the MP with smallest overall
slot usage leaves more vacant slots available for future demands.
4) The SDON controller then reserves the network resources based on the selected MP to service the given VON
demand.
5) If no valid MP is available, this VON demand is blocked.
Due to the exponential nature of the procedure, further improvement may be needed when handling VON demands
with a large number of vNodes and/or large node mapping flexibility, to obtain valid MPs within a reasonable
timeframe. For example, instead of obtaining all candidate MPs at once in Step 1, the candidate MPs can be generated
sequentially, starting from fixed node mapping (all vNodes mapped to their central physical nodes) gradually to more
flexible node mapping (e.g. flexibility up to 1-hop neighboring nodes from the central node, 2-hop, 3-hop and so on ).
In addition, the generation of candidate MPs can be processed in parallel with the resource allocation trial described in
Step 2. Considering the tradeoff between timeliness and optimality, the SDON controller can either start resource
allocation immediately once a valid MP is found by MPCE (in more real-time operation scenarios) or collect a certain
number of valid MPs received from MPCE within a time limit and then choose the best possible solution (in network
planning or less real-time operation scenarios).
 W3H.3.pdf OFC 2014 © OSA 2014

4. Performance evaluation
Performance evaluation is carried out through simulations on 14-node 23-link DTnet [7] considering quasi-static VON
provisioning (VON demands arrive one-by-one; a mapped VON is never torn down). The spectrum slot size is 12.5
GHz and the number of slots per link is 352. We consider the following line rates and modulation formats: 400G DP-
QPSK 137.5 GHz with 2000 km reach; 400G DP-16QAM 75 GHz with 400 km reach, 100G DP-QPSK 37.5 GHz with
2000 km reach. The number of vNodes of a VON demand is randomly generated between 2 and 5. Each vNode has a
nodal degree between 1 and 3. For single rate case, all vLinks are 400G. For mixed rate case, the capacity of a vLink is
randomly selected between 100G and 400G in equal probability. Each vNode in a VON demand is randomly assigned
with a different central physical node. A vNode is allowed to be mapped to a set of candidate physical nodes whose path
distances from its central physical node are less than the Flexibility Distance, which is varied from 0 km (fixed node
mapping) up to 700 km (max-flexibility node mapping) in 100 km step. Note that multiple vNodes of a VON demand
are not allowed to be mapped to the same physical node during provisioning. For each simulation run, 1000 static VON
demands are pre-generated randomly and offered to the network sequentially. After all 1000 VON demands are
processed, the total carried traffic for all succeeded VON demands is calculated and averaged over 10 simulation runs.
We calculate the increase of network capacity based on {(New Capacity - Original Capacity) / (Original Capacity)}
* 100%. Three capacity increase metrics are: 1) Capacity increase due to Distance-Adaptive (DA), which compares the
total carried traffic between DA (DP-QPSK, DP-16QAM) vs. Non-DA (DP-QPSK only) under the same node mapping
flexibility distance; 2) Capacity increase due to node mapping flexibility, which compares the total carried traffic
between DA with flexible node mapping vs. DA with fixed node mapping (flexibility distance = 0 km) ; and 3)
Capacity increase due to DA + node mapping flexibility, which compares the total carried traffic between DA with
flexible node mapping vs. Non-DA with fixed node mapping.
Fig. 2 shows total carried traffic (left) and network capacity increase % (right) vs. node mapping flexibility distance
for 400G single rate VON provisioning. Fig. 3 shows the same set of results for 100G/400G mixed rate case. Overall,
we achieve up to 80% capacity increase for 400G (55% for 100G/400G) due to DA, up to 270% (260% for 100G/400G)
capacity increase due to node mapping flexibility, and up to 350% (320% for 100G/400G) capacity increase due to
combined effect of DA and node mapping flexibility. The capacity increase saturates at around 400 km flexibility
distance, indicating that a moderate level of flexibility is sufficient for efficient provisioning. For both 400G single rate
and 100G/400G mixed rate, using DA with 400 km flexibility distance, the effective network capacity is quadrupled
compared to Non-DA with fixed node mapping.
We also evaluated a flexible lightpath provisioning scenario in which all VON demands consist of 2 vNodes and 1
vLink. Such a scenario may serve as an intermediate solution for operators who are not ready for VON service, yet want
to leverage the flexibility in node selection for lightpath provisioning. The results show similar trends as VON
provisioning, with up to 80% for 400G (55% for 100G/400G), 150% (150%), and 210% (210%) capacity increase
achieved respectively (plots not shown due to space limitation).
600 400 500 350
Total Carried Traffic (Tbps)

Total Carried Traffic (Tbps)

Non-Distance Adaptive Non-Distance Adaptive

Capacity Increase (%)
Capacity Increase (%)

500 300
Distance Adaptive 400
300 Distance Adaptive 250
400
300 200
300 200 Distance Adaptive Distance Adaptive
Node flexibility 200 150
200 Node flexibility
100 DA+node flexibility 100
100 DA+node flexibility
100 50
0 0 0 0
0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700
Node Mapping Flexibility Distance (km) Node Mapping Flexibility Distance (km) Node Mapping Flexibility Distance (km) Node Mapping Flexibility Distance (km)
Fig.2. Total carried traffic and network capacity increase for 400G single rate. Fig.3. Total carried traffic and network capacity increase for 100G/400G mixed rate.

5. Conclusion
We proposed and evaluated a flexible VON provisioning procedure for distance-adaptive flex-grid optical networks.
Our procedure aimed at maximizing spectrum utilization efficiency by leveraging the combined effect of flexible node
mapping enabled by SDON and efficient spectrum utilization brought by distance-adaptive modulation. We found that
distance-adaptive modulation and moderate level of node mapping flexibility can significantly increase the effective
network capacity compared to non-distance-adaptive modulation with fixed node mapping. We conclude that such
flexible VON provisioning will benefit the future deployment of inter-datacenter networks based on distance-adaptive
flex-grid optical networks.
6. References
[1] D. Simeonidou, et al., “Software Defined Optical Networks Technology and Infrastructure: Enabling Software-Defined Optical Network Operations,” OFC 2013, OTh1H.3.
[2] S. Peng, et al., “Virtual Optical Network Composition over Single-Line-Rate and Mixed-Line-Rate WDM Optical Networks,” OFC 2012, OW1A.2.
[3] Q. Zhang, et al., “RWA for Network Virtualization in Optical WDM Networks,” OFC 2013, JTh2A.65.
[4] A. Patel, et al., “Distance-Adaptive Virtual Network Embedding in Software-Defined Optical Networks,” OECC/PS 2013, WQ3-2.
[5] A. Hammad, et al., “Novel Approaches for composition of online virtual optical networks utilizing O-OFDM technology,” ECOC 2013, Mo.4.E.4.
[6] S. Peng, et al., “Application-aware and Adaptive Virtual Data Centre Infrastructure Provisioning over Elastic Optical OFDM Networks,” ECOC 2013, Mo.3.E.6.
[7] K. Manousakis and E. Varvarigos, “A Comparative Study of Node Architectures with Add/Drop Constraints in WDM Networks,” Optical Fiber Communications and
Devices, Dr Moh. Yasin (Ed.), ISBN: 978-953-307-954-7