Workshop 1: Fiber-Wireless Convergence for 6G Vision towards 2030
Workshop 3: The chances and challenges of hollow core fibers for communication
Workshop 4: Integrated Photoelectric Information Processing Technology
Workshop 6: Opportunities and Challenges for Next Generation AI-native Fixed Access Network (AI FAN)
Workshop 7: When optical networks meet fibre sensing, what is the killer application?
Workshop 8: Optical Satellite Communications and Networking Towards F6G
Workshop 9: Challenges and Solutions of Optical Switching in Empowering AI Computing Centers
Workshop 10: Optical sensing and communication in autonomous driving vehicles
Workshop 1: Fiber-Wireless Convergence for 6G Vision towards 2030
Description:
Fiber optic communication and high-frequency wireless communication form the core technological foundation of the new generation of information technology. The integration of fiber and wireless communication is of great importance for constructing the typical 6G scenarios towards 2030, including ubiquitous connectivity, immersive communication, integrated sensing and communication, and integrated intelligence and communication.
Workshop 2: High-speed Optical Transmissions for Data Center/ Intelligent Computing Center Interconnects
Description:
Driven by broadband optoelectronic devices, high-speed AD/DA converters, new transmission technologies, and novel digital signal processing methods, short-reach optical communication has become essential to meet the surging demand for future data transmission in data centers and AI computing infrastructures.
This workshop focuses on the key issues and latest advancements in short-reach optical fiber communications, tailored for high-performance, low-latency, and energy-efficient interconnects for data center and intelligent computing center .
Topics include but not limit to the high data-rate real-time transmissions under IM/DD and coherent frameworks, ultra-wideband signal mod/demod and signal processing, simplified coherent architectures, advanced device integration, and efficient channel modeling. In addition, the workshop will explore emerging areas such as novel access networks, intelligent fault diagnosis, mid-infrared communications, and cross-disciplinary innovations bridging photonics, computing, and AI.
This workshop invites researchers and engineers from academia and industry to share breakthroughs in device design, system implementation, and algorithm development, promoting collaboration and accelerating the deployment of next-generation short-reach optical communication systems for data-intensive environments.
Workshop 3: The chances and challenges of hollow core fibers for communication
Description:
With the booming development of new digital services such as artificial intelligence, cloud computing, and industrial internet, the high-capacity and low-latency characteristics are becoming increasingly important in optical fiber networks. However, the capacity limitations of traditional silicon-based fiber systems are becoming apparent in the high-speed transmission system. Meanwhile, the latency cannot be reduced due to the transmission medium. Hollow Core Fiber (HCF) has excellent transmission performance such as low latency, low attenuation, and low dispersion. Recently, a number of fiber manufacturers have reported the latest progress on HCF, which show that the lowest attenuation coefficient has exceeded that of traditional silicon-based fiber. Moreover, the fiber deployment projects and the field trails with single-wave rates ranging from 10G-1.2T have been carried out in the many countries. Those indicate that the technologies of HCF system are moving rapidly from the laboratory to commercialization, but the application of the new-type fiber still faces numerous challenges.
This workshop will review the development status of key technologies of HCF transmission systems and explore the critical issues related to their application from aspects of fibers, devices, systems, standardizations, etc.
Workshop 4: Integrated Photoelectric Information Processing Technology
Description:
The integraton of photonics and electronics is the main technical path to solve the problems of "high speed, low power consumption, intelligence" faced by information technology, and has shown great technical advantages and potential. Integrated photoelectric information/signal processing technology, facilitated by photoelectric integrated circuits, offer distinct advantages including low interconnect latency, high bandwidth, immunity to electromagnetic interference, and low power consumption. After decades of development, information/signal processing devices have developed from fiber optic devices, passive integration, and active integration to photoelectric integration. At present, information/signal processing technologies face three major challenges: ultra-high speed, ultra-low power consumption, and intelligent integration.
The purpose of this workshop is to provide an overview of ongoing progress and trends in advancing the knowledge, understanding, and novel applications of integrated photoelectric information/signal processing technology. Areas of interest include (but are not limited to):
●Photoelectric materials and devices for signal processing
●Ultrafast nonlinear photonics science
●Programmable and integrated photonics for signal processing
●Integrated Photonics for AI and neuromorphic computing
●Integrated Photonic signal processing for sensing and communications
●Integrated photonics for 6G networks
●AI/machine learning for photonic device design and signal processing
●Integrated microwave photonic signal processing and sensing
●Optical frequency combs for photonic signal processing
●Quantum photonic signal processing
Workshop 5: Network Transformation in the AI Era: Building a Full-Optical Interconnection Foundation to Support Ubiquitous Intelligence
Description:
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is rapidly permeating every aspect of production and daily life, creating a ubiquitous demand for intelligent services and computational power. This requires networks to possess ultra-high bandwidth, ultra-low latency, and intelligent coordination to support the real-time flow and processing of massive AI-driven data. At the same time, AI technology will profoundly empower the intelligent evolution of the networks. This workshop will focus on two core topics: "How future optical networks can support ubiquitous AI" and "How AI can drive the intelligence of optical networks". The aim is to consolidate industry consensus, identify key technologies and core demands, and jointly advance an AION target architecture for cloud-network-intelligence convergence in the AI era.
Workshop 6: Opportunities and Challenges for Next Generation AI-native Fixed Access Network (AI FAN)
Description:
From this year, the access industry started to deploy the latest generation PON, i.e. 50GPON. It leverages the national “1G Optical Network” to "10G Optical Network". To look forward to the next decade, it is widely discussed that the next generation PON should not only pursue the higher data rate (200Gbit/s) and lower latency, but also integrate with AI for better experiences and more instant services. It means the in-premises network should be tightly incorporated with the 200GPON, driven by AI utilization, to provide premium quality of service for the final customers. The two key challenges are to specify such an end-to-end network from OLT to the final STAs via PON, FTTR and Wi-Fi, and to enable intelligent operation as well as maintenance of the network including the ODN infrastructure. This workshop aiming to bring together experts from academia and industry will explore the innovations for that next generation AI-native access and in-premises network, technologies and applications.
Workshop 7: When optical networks meet fibre sensing, what is the killer application?
Description:
Optical fibre is the most suitable media, not only for optical network transmission, but also for distributed sensing. Both of these two main technologies all have decades histories of development since the innovation of fibre. Now, optical networks meet fibre sensing, convergent optical communication and sensing, attract deeply discussions across the industrial and academic, cross the fibre transmission and fibre sensing. Different fibre sensing techniques could be integrated with optical networks, including back-scattering effect based sensing, coherent DSP based sensing. And the optical networks could be the access network, metro networks, longhaul backbone networks, and even transoceanic submarine cable systems. With the enhanced sensing ability and awareness of the around status of fibre/cable, convergent optical communication and sensing could obtain many advantages, to upgrade the reliability and operation of itself, and to provide sensing as a service externally. With quite hot discussions for years, while commercial deployment is still on the way, so what is the killer application, for convergent optical communication and sensing, to make the closed-loop of new technique. The workshop invite opinions to focusing on these issues, how to integrate fibre sensing with different optical networks, how to achieve it cost-effectively, what is the killer application for end-user, especially the operators.
Workshop 8: Optical Satellite Communications and Networking Towards F6G
Description:
Optical satellite communications and networking are rapidly advancing as critical technologies to meet the growing global demand for high-capacity, low-latency, and secure connectivity. Leveraging the vast potential of free-space optical links, these systems promise to revolutionize satellite networks by enabling terabit-per-second data rates, interference-free transmission, and enhanced resilience against jamming and interception.
This workshop provides a dedicated forum for academic and industry researchers to exchange the latest developments, challenges, and future directions in optical satellite communications. Topics of interest include inter-satellite optical links, ground-to-satellite and satellite-to-ground optical communications, space-based optical switching and routing, network control and resource management, and integration with terrestrial and space networks. The workshop will also address enabling technologies such as advanced modulation and coding, precision beam pointing, adaptive optics, and digital signal processing for spaceborne environments.
By convening experts across the fields of satellite systems, photonics, networking, and space engineering, this workshop aims to foster interdisciplinary collaboration and identify innovative solutions to current technical bottlenecks. It will serve as a platform to discuss system architectures, experimental testbeds, standardization efforts, and roadmap strategies for deploying scalable and sustainable optical satellite networks to support next-generation global communications.
Workshop 9: Challenges and Solutions of Optical Switching in Empowering AI Computing Centers
Description:
As artificial intelligence (AI) computing centers rapidly scale to meet the increasing demands of large-scale model training and inference, the underlying network infrastructure faces growing pressure in bandwidth, latency, scalability, and energy efficiency. In this context, optical switching technology, with its inherent advantages such as ultra-high bandwidth and low latency, is increasingly recognized as a key enabler for future intelligent computing infrastructures. However, deploying optical switching technologies in AI computing centers still faces several critical challenges at both technical and application levels. From application perspective, the specific use cases in scale-up and scale-out networks, along with the core value they bring, require further discussion and clarification. From application perspetive, switching granularity is often fixed and cannot simultaneously support multiple levels of traffic volume. Additionally, switching scale is limited by device bottlenecks, making large-scale expansion difficult. Furthermore, network configuration requires significant control time, hindering support for the highly dynamic traffic demands typical of emerging AI applications. This workshop will explore these technical bottlenecks and discuss recent advances in optical switching devices, high-dimensional optical switching architectures, and network control strategies tailored for distributed AI workloads. Through both academic and industrial perspectives, we aim to identify feasible paths toward building scalable, efficient, and future-proof optical networks for AI computing centers.
Workshop 10: Optical sensing and communication in autonomous driving vehicles
Description:
In autonomous driving vehicles, Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR), as the core environment sensor, provides key spatial information input for scene understanding through accurate calculation of the geometry, spatial position, and motion vector of surrounding objects. With the introduction of optical fiber communication, the intra-vehicle optical network (IVON) constitutes a high-speed data transmission infrastructure within vehicles, which can reliably transmit massive raw data generated by sensors such as high-definition cameras and LiDAR in real time to ensure the data integrity of the decision-making control system under complex working conditions. LiDAR and IVON work together to support the robustness and functional safety of the autonomous driving system. However, as emerging technologies, LiDAR and IVON are both debated in multiple directions. Therefore, this workshop hopes to invite experts from academia and industry in related fields to conduct in-depth discussions on the different technical routes involved.
