The present invention is related to the field of optical switches and, more particularly, to optical switches in which the switching function is effected by electromechanical devices.
In a 1.times.N optical switch, a single optical fiber forms an optical path with an optical fiber selected from N optical fibers. Thus a signal on the single optical fiber is transmitted to the selected fiber. Similarly a signal on the selected fiber is passed to the single optical fiber. A switch permits the optical connection to be changed from the selected fiber to another of the N fibers.
In electromechanical 1.times.N optical switches, the switching operation is effected by the movement of an end of the single optical fiber relative to the ends of the N optical fibers. To form an optical path, the end of the single optical fiber is aligned with the end of the selected fiber from the N fibers. In such systems alignment of the fiber ends is critical and the much effort is required with the electromechanical drive devices, such as motors and their movements, to ensure precise and reproducible alignment of the single fiber with each of the N optical fibers. Nonetheless, performance of such switches has remained poor with use restricted to multimode optical fibers. In present day optical networks it is often desirable to use single mode optical fibers.
The present invention presents an electromechanical 1.times.N optical switch with high optical performance. Moreover, with the present invention single mode optical fibers may be used.