Abstract: The crosstalk of the five OXC architectures based on space switches is analyzed. Afterwards the output power equations for the five topologies are derived in the worst case. According to the equations, the total crosstalk as a function of the component(demultiplexer/multiplexer and space switches) crosstalk or the number of fibers(and the number of wavelengths) is studied in detail. From the comparison among five OXC architectures we can determine that the crosstalk performance of topology basd on separate components is the best. It is concluded that crosstalk performance of OXC depends not only on the component parameters, but also on its architecture.

Key words: dense wavelength division multiplexing, crosstalk, optical cross connect(OXC), space switches