(19)
(11) EP 1 146 386 A8

(12) CORRECTED EUROPEAN PATENT APPLICATION

(48) Corrigendum issued on:
02.01.2002 Bulletin 2002/01

(43) Date of publication:
17.10.2001 Bulletin 2001/42

(21) Application number: 00810326.9

(22) Date of filing: 14.04.2000
(51) International Patent Classification (IPC)7G02F 1/295, H04Q 11/00, G02B 6/122
(84) Designated Contracting States:
AT BE CH CY DE DK ES FI FR GB GR IE IT LI LU MC NL PT SE
Designated Extension States:
AL LT LV MK RO SI

(71) Applicant: International Business Machines Corporation
Armonk, NY 10504 (US)

(72) Inventor:
  • Horst, Folkert
    8802 Kilchberg (CH)

(74) Representative: Williams, Julian David et al
International Business Machines Corporation, Säumerstrasse 4
8803 Rüschlikon
8803 Rüschlikon (CH)

   


(54) Free-space non-blocking switch


(57) Optical switch (70) integrated into a substrate, comprising N input channels (74-76) with N input optical free space elements (181-183), a large optical free space element (151), N input tunable optical lenses (152-154) with adjustable projection characteristic for projecting light waves received from the input optical free space elements (181-183) into the large free space element (151). The switch further comprises M output channels (190-192) with M output optical free space elements (77-79), M output tunable optical lenses (155-157) with adjustable receiving characteristic for capturing the light wave from the large free space element (151) and for feeding the light wave to the M output optical free space elements (77-79).