Terabit Optical Wireless Link Design for Inter-Rack Communication in 6G Data Center Networks

In today's data center networks (DCNs), a single rack can generate Terabit data traffic, and consequently inter-rack communication may undergo a throughput bottleneck. We consider a spatial multiplexing multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) optical wireless link design as a cost-effective solution for 6G DCNs. We use a transmitter array based on low-cost vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSELs) and a non-imaging receiver array with compound parabolic concentrators (CPCs). The system performance is evaluated under lateral and angular pointing errors. Through simulation results, we demonstrate how the link can be designed to reach Tb/s data rates and study its misalignment tolerance ranges.