To accelerate research on Beyond 5G (B5G) technologies in Japan, we propose an algorithm that designs mesh-type metropolitan area network (MAN) models based on a priori Japanese regional railway information, because ground-truth communication network information is unavailable. Instead, we use the information of regional railways, which is expected to express the necessary geometric structure of our metropolitan cities while remaining strongly correlated with their population densities and demographic variations. We provide an additional compression algorithm for use in reducing a small-scale network model from the original MAN model designed using the proposed algorithm. Two Tokyo MAN models are created, and we provide day and night variants for each while highlighting the number of passengers alighting/boarding at each station and the respective population densities. The validity of the proposed algorithm is verified through comparisons with the Japan Photonic Network model and another model designed using the communication network information, which is not ground-truth. Comparison results show that our proposed algorithm is effective for designing MAN models and that our result provides a valid Tokyo MAN model.

Indoor free space optical (FSO) communication technology that provides high-speed connectivity to edge users is expected to be introduced in the near future mobile communication system, where the silicon photonics solid-state beam scanning device is a promising tool because of its low cost, long-term reliability, and other beneficial properties. However, the current two-dimensional beam scanning devices using grating coupler arrays have difficulty in increasing the transmission capacity because of bandwidth regulation. To solve the problem, we have introduced a broadband surface optical coupler, “elephant coupler,” which has great potential for combining wavelength and spatial division multiplexing technologies into the beam scanning device, as an alternative to grating couplers. The prototype port-selective silicon beam scanning device fabricated using a 300 mm CMOS pilot line achieved broadband optical beam emission with a 1 dB-loss bandwidth of 40 nm and demonstrated beam scanning using an imaging lens. The device has also exhibited free-space signal transmission of non-return-to-zero on-off-keying signals at 10 Gbps over a wide wavelength range of 60 nm. In this paper, we present an overview of the developed beam scanning device. Furthermore, the theoretical design guidelines for indoor mobile FSO communication are discussed.

We review our research progress of multi-port optical switches based on the silicon photonics platform. Up to now, the maximum port-count is 32 input ports×32 output ports, in which transmissions of all paths were demonstrated. The switch topology is path-independent insertion-loss (PILOSS) which consists of an array of 2×2 element switches and intersections. The switch presented an average fiber-to-fiber insertion loss of 10.8 dB. Moreover, -20-dB crosstalk bandwidth of 14.2 nm was achieved with output-port-exchanged element switches, and an average polarization-dependent loss (PDL) of 3.2 dB was achieved with a non-duplicated polarization-diversity structure enabled by SiN overpass waveguides. In the 8×8 switch, we demonstrated wider than 100-nm bandwidth for less than -30-dB crosstalk with double Mach-Zehnder element switches, and less than 0.5 dB PDL with polarization diversity scheme which consisted of two switch matrices and fiber-type polarization beam splitters. Based on the switch performances described above, we discuss further improvement of switching performances.