The unprecedented growth of optical fibre infrastructure in recent decades has underpinned telecommunications and the Internet, making possible broadband communications, e-commerce, video-on-demand and streaming media, tele-presence and high performance distributed computing. It has dramatically changed the whole landscape of public, business and government activities, stimulating relentless traffic growth. This necessitates a clear strategy to sustain the growth in information-carrying digital communications infrastructure. Infrastructure is the backbone of our economydigital communication infrastructure needs urgent attention since it underpins almost every aspect of economy and society. It should be flexible, adaptable, capable of continuous and smooth evolution with well-understood performance limits over its full life-cycle. This outline proposal addresses the first of the main cross cutting challenges of TI3 - The communications bottleneck. A future intelligent information infrastructure needs to intelligently manage massive amounts of data, to ensure efficient communications and exploit the content and information that will be available. It is in this context that we view this proposal as vital to the development of the future of information society. The role of fibre communications, providing the capacity for the lion's share of the total information traffic, is vital. However, to make the most efficient use of the optical fibre infrastructure requires that it can be accessed transparently, and on demand, by users, data, services and applications. To ensure this requires a completely different approach to the design of the communications infrastructure. It requires the optical resources (which include transmitters, receivers, fibre communication channels and routers) to be abstracted in a way to ensure the seamlessness of resource. The infrastructure will be treated as a service, accessible over the cloud. Optical layer capabilities such as capacity, latency, and spectrum availability could then be abstracted, become transparently accessible by using a unified interface. This requires the development of a new framework capable of uniformly representing and abstracting the heterogeneous optical resources in the optical layer, taking into account the various attributes and constraints of the optical infrastructure. Current optical network abstraction and virtualization research activities have focused on optical systems which are designed and optimised to have a fixed number of channels communicating at a given speed optimised over a defined set of distances. However, to maximise the use of optical infrastructure requires a flexible approach about how it is allocated, for how long and at what rate. The complexity and adaptability of advance optical communication systems (variable and adaptive modulation formats, rates, flexible nodes, etc.) pose numerous challenges on choosing the suitable description format and level of abstraction. Such process will simplify the control of underlying complex optical systems and in turn transparently provide services to the users with diverse business models and needs in a flexible, reconfigurable and intelligent. The framework developed in the course of will have insight about how to maximise the capacity of the infrastructure, whilst minimising energy and delay enabling transformational applications and services to be delivered intelligently and seamlessly.

Optical network infrastructure has underpinned the Internet pervading everyone in some way and has stimulated relentless traffic growth. Current network infrastructure is made of stacked layers of function rigid systems. That includes optical switching nodes in conjunction with a set of transmission (i.e. 100Gbps and beyond) and transport (e.g. OTN) systems as well as Layer 2 switches, IP routers, to deliver end-to-end network infrastructure. Such networks are designed and optimised to deliver a fixed set of functionalities for the lifetime of their deployment. Recently there is a shift towards creating a more flexible control and transport by use of software defined network (SDN). SDN however introduces an inbuilt assumption that there is relatively dumb hardware for data switching and forwarding while having relatively intelligent software. This inherently restricts the flexibility of a network environment. The vision behind this project is to introduce and investigate a radically new and groundbreaking approach to accommodate future infrastructure needs in a more agile, flexible, programmable and evolvable manner down to the hardware level. This will be delivered by open programmable hardware eco-system (photonic and electronic) where the software/hardware programmable devices can be synthesized on-demand to support any and as many function(s) and layers and be re-purposed during their lifetime. Software/Hardware network functions can be interconnected electronically and/or optically to compose and synthesize a system on demand. This is an original and disruptive concept and proposal that defines the Synthetic Node and Network system. It is expected to deliver a breakthrough on Internet and beyond. The synthesis will consist of interconnection of electronic (e.g. FPGA processing blocks) and photonic (e.g. switching, elastic filtering, amplification, multicasting, etc.) function blocks to compose an fused on-chip off-chip system necessary to perform a particular function and deliver the associated network performance. Such approach eliminates the notion of dimensioning, deploying and provisioning applied on traditional networks designed with function rigid systems. The software-hardware function blocks can be also re-used on any future general-purpose programmable hardware (e.g FPGA/SoC) eliminating disruptive migration lifecycles. This also allows for network users (e.g. operators, service providers) to re-purpose the functions on their physical or virtual infrastructure on demand to suit the network service needs. This inherently redefines the system infrastructure and creates a new research field that fuses electronic and photonic programmability that opens up a new set of opportunities and challenges. The project will first investigate the formulation of function block behaviour realised both in electronics (i.e. data queuing, framing, protocols) and photonics (i.e. filtering, multiplexing, frequency/space switching). Such function blocks will be interconnected by an network topology (on-chip and off-chip) through the use of synthesis algorithms to compose a complete system. To deliver efficient synthesis, the composition framework and algorithms will consider infrastructure constraints (FPGA timing/space, and optical sub-system characteristics). Techniques will be devised and investigated to deliver isolation between distinct network programmable functions that co-exist on the same opto-electronic hardware substrate. The project provides direct contribution spanning across multiple EPSRC Priority Areas such as ICT networks and distributed systems as well as optical communications and micro-electronics design. Specifically it addresses the Towards an Intelligent Information Infrastructure (TI3) challenge. So it consequently fits with the EPSRC Working Together priority. It is this context that SONATAS is vital to the development of the future of information society.

The unprecedented growth of optical fibre infrastructure in recent decades has underpinned telecommunications and the Internet, making possible broadband communications, e-commerce, video-on-demand and streaming media, tele-presence and high performance distributed computing. It has dramatically changed the whole landscape of public, business and government activities, stimulating relentless traffic growth. This necessitates a clear strategy to sustain the growth in information-carrying digital communications infrastructure. Infrastructure is the backbone of our economydigital communication infrastructure needs urgent attention since it underpins almost every aspect of economy and society. It should be flexible, adaptable, capable of continuous and smooth evolution with well-understood performance limits over its full life-cycle. This outline proposal addresses the first of the main cross cutting challenges of TI3 - The communications bottleneck. A future intelligent information infrastructure needs to intelligently manage massive amounts of data, to ensure efficient communications and exploit the content and information that will be available. It is in this context that we view this proposal as vital to the development of the future of information society. The role of fibre communications, providing the capacity for the lion's share of the total information traffic, is vital. However, to make the most efficient use of the optical fibre infrastructure requires that it can be accessed transparently, and on demand, by users, data, services and applications. To ensure this requires a completely different approach to the design of the communications infrastructure. It requires the optical resources (which include transmitters, receivers, fibre communication channels and routers) to be abstracted in a way to ensure the seamlessness of resource. The infrastructure will be treated as a service, accessible over the cloud. Optical layer capabilities such as capacity, latency, and spectrum availability could then be abstracted, become transparently accessible by using a unified interface. This requires the development of a new framework capable of uniformly representing and abstracting the heterogeneous optical resources in the optical layer, taking into account the various attributes and constraints of the optical infrastructure. Current optical network abstraction and virtualization research activities have focused on optical systems which are designed and optimised to have a fixed number of channels communicating at a given speed optimised over a defined set of distances. However, to maximise the use of optical infrastructure requires a flexible approach about how it is allocated, for how long and at what rate. The complexity and adaptability of advance optical communication systems (variable and adaptive modulation formats, rates, flexible nodes, etc.) pose numerous challenges on choosing the suitable description format and level of abstraction. Such process will simplify the control of underlying complex optical systems and in turn transparently provide services to the users with diverse business models and needs in a flexible, reconfigurable and intelligent. The framework developed in the course of will have insight about how to maximise the capacity of the infrastructure, whilst minimising energy and delay enabling transformational applications and services to be delivered intelligently and seamlessly.

The rapid growth of the rich variety of connected devices, from sensors, to cars, to wearables, to smart buildings, is placing a varied and highly complex set of bandwidth, latency, priority, reliability, power, roaming, and cost requirements on how these devices connect and on how information is moved around. Efficient communications remains a very difficult challenge for our digital world, and understanding how to design devices and systems that make good trade-offs between these different requirements requires skills from several disciplines. MANGI will underpin the critical mass and expertise in Bristol's Smart Internet and Devices Laboratory (SIDL) enabling the creation of a Next Generation Internet, with career development of our senior and most talented postdoctoral researchers forming a core part of our activity. Bristol's SIDL brings together the Smart Internet Lab (SIL) in Electrical & Electronic Engineering and the Centre for Device Thermography and Reliability (CDTR) in Physics at the University of Bristol, and has a world-leading track record, spanning the complete digital communication engine from novel wide bandgap semiconductor RF/optical devices to state-of-the-art high performance network architecture design and operation, on the pathway to enabling the Next Generation Internet. New devices and materials are critically needed as key enablers for the necessary transition from the current to the Next Generation Internet which needs to be energy efficient and provide highly flexible connectivity across optical-wireless domains. Using pump-priming projects to retain and develop our outstanding postdoctoral researchers, revolutionary interdisciplinary approaches will be developed in order to adopt high risk strategies focused on grand challenges aimed at enabling the Next Generation Internet. This approach taken is not possible with standard mode funding. Advances in component technologies, to provide higher speed/linearity, higher power devices, more compact device and packaging design, alongside use of new materials will have transformative impact upon network operation. The flexibility of the platform will be a corner stone of MANGI, allowing our most senior postdoctoral researchers to develop and drive their own research ideas, with interdisciplinary mentoring by senior members of SIDL and industry. This will help remove blockages in current technology and overcome the current internet infrastructure challenges. Standard research paths are not able to support independent development and innovation at physical and network layer functionalities, protocols, and services, while at the same time supporting the increasing bandwidth demands of changing and diverse applications, largely because of current limitations in semiconductor device and packaging technology and a lack of co-design of the multitude of constituent parts.

Optical fibres lie at the heart of our increasingly technological society, for example: supporting the internet and mobile communications that we all now take for granted, saving lives through medical diagnosis and interventions using fibre-optic endoscopes, and enabling the mass production of a huge array of commercial products through fibre laser based materials processing. However, current fibre optics technology has its limitations due largely to the fact that the light is confined to a solid glass core. This places fundamental restrictions on the power and wavelength range over which signals can be transmitted, the speed at which signals propagate, and in terms of sensitivity to the external environment. These limits are now starting to impose restrictions in many application areas. For example, in telecommunications, nonlinear interactions between wavelength channels limit the maximum overall data transmission capacity of current single mode fibres to ~100-200 Tbit/s (for amplified terrestrial systems). Moreover, nonlinear, thermal and material damage thresholds combine to limit the maximum peak and average powers that can be delivered in a tightly focusable beam. This restricts the range of potential uses, particularly in the important ultrashort pulse regime increasingly used for a wide variety of materials processing applications These limitations can in principle be overcome by exploiting new light guidance mechanisms in fibres with a hollow core surrounded by a fine glass microstructure. Such fibres are generally referred to as Hollow Core Fibres (HCFs). Within this Programme we will seek to reinvent fibre optics technology and will replace the glass core with air or vacuum to produce Optical Fibres 2.0, offering vastly superior but largely unexplored potential. Our ultimate vision is that of a Connected World, where devices, machines, data centres and cities can be linked through these hollow light pipes for faster, cheaper, more resilient and secure communications. A Greener and Healthier World, where intense laser light can be channelled to produce goods and run combustion engines more efficiently and to image cancer tissues inside our bodies in real time. And an Explorative World, where hollow lightguides will enable scientific breakthroughs in attosecond science, particle physics, metrology and interplanetary exploration. Our overall ambition is therefore to revisit the way we think about light guidance and to develop a disruptive technology that challenges conventional thinking. The programme will provide the UK with a world-leading position both in HCF technology itself and in the many new applications and services that it will support.