15 Mar 2026
13:00 - 15:30
Room 515A
This workshop will delve into the real-world potential of anti-resonant hollow-core fibers (AR-HCFs) and their role in shaping the future of optical systems. Praised for their ultra-low latency, low loss, and minimal nonlinearity, AR-HCFs have captured the attention of both academia and industry. Yet, moving from laboratory breakthroughs to large-scale deployment presents significant challenges—from manufacturing at scale and mitigating CO₂ absorption, to achieving reliable fusion splicing. The first session will focus on the fiber itself— its design, performance, and the technical hurdles that must be overcome for large-scale production.
The second session will consider HCF applications. Today, data center interconnects (DCI) dominate the discussion around HCF, leveraging lower latency to nearly double the area for DC placement. But will DCI remain the primary driver, or will other segments—such as long-haul network or intra–data center links-benefit too? Discussions will also address the economic factors that could shape broader adoption.
- What are the main technical challenges in scaling AR-HCF manufacturing for commercial deployment?
- What advancements are needed to achieve reliable fusion splicing with AR-HCFs (HCF-HCF, and SSMF-HCF)?
- How can Gas absorption in AR-HCFs be mitigated to ensure consistent performance across environments?
- Will HCF deployment be limited to DCI, or will it also cover other markets that are less latency sensitive such as Long haul, submarine…? Or inside DC where length are limited and latency saving will be more limited ?
- Will HCF deployment trigger development of really different WDM systems than current ones (much higher power optical amplifiers, different optical bandwidths, bidirectional), or current systems are suitable to support HCF?
- What is an acceptable cost point to see deployment of HCF (having in mind that outside China, G654 that outperforms G652 has seen only marginal deployments) and will it possible to reach it?
Organizers
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Gabriel Charlet
Huawei Technologies France, France
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Lauren Dallachiesa
Nokia, United States
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Hesham Sakr
Microsoft, United Kingdom
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Jiajing Tu
Jinan University, China
Speakers
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Abdallah Ali
Microsoft, United Kingdom
Abdallah Ali is a Senior Cloud Network Engineer at Microsoft, United Kingdom, specializing in Hollowcore Fiber (HCF) technology and advanced optical transmission systems. His work focuses on developing energy-efficient, high-capacity communication links using state-of-the-art transmission technologies. Prior to joining Microsoft, Abdallah completed his PhD in Optical Communications and spent two years as a postdoctoral researcher developing energy-efficient data transmission systems. He has authored more than 40 publications and conference papers, including a book chapter, and continues to contribute to innovations that advance sustainable, high-performance optical networking.
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Michael Frosz
Max-Planck-Inst Physik des Lichts, Germany
Michael H. Frosz received his Ph.D. degree from the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) in 2006 for his work on theory and modeling of supercontinuum generation in photonic crystal fibers (PCFs). He then continued working in industry in the field of supercontinuum generation. In 2008, he returned to academia to become the principal investigator of a project involving the fabrication of polymer PCFs. From 2010, he was an assistant professor at DTU. However, in 2011, he joined the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light in Germany to head the Fiber Fabrication Technology Unit. There, he fabricated hollow-core bandgap fibers with some of the lowest losses ever demonstrated at that time.
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Dawei Ge
China Mobile Research Institute, China
Dawei Ge is a Research Scientist at China Mobile Research Institute. He received his Ph.D. in optical communications from Peking University in 2020. His research focuses on high-speed WDM networks, hollow-core fiber transmission systems, and Tb/s-class optical communications. He has authored over 80 journal/conference papers and serves as an editor for technical reports on hollow-core fibers in CCSA. Now, he is in charge of China Mobile’s hollow-core fiber and transmission system research and field trials/deployments, including the first commercial deployment of HCF cable link in China.
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Mohammed Selim Habib
Florida Institute of Technology, United States
Md Selim Habib received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Photonics Engineering from the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) in 2017. He subsequently held postdoctoral positions at DTU and CREOL, University of Central Florida, USA. He is currently an Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering at the Florida Institute of Technology, USA. His research interests include computational electromagnetics, next-generation optical fibers, and ultrafast nonlinear optics. Dr. Habib has published over 100 papers in leading journals and conferences. He is a Senior Member of Optica and serves as an Associate Editor of IEEE Journal of Lightwave Technology and Feature Editor of Applied Optics.
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Peng Li
YOFC, China
Peng Li joined Yangtze Optical Fibre and Cable Joint Stock Limited Company (YOFC) in 2014, where he has since grown into a core technical leader in optical fiber R&D. He has participated in the R&D of novel optical fibers such as ULL G.654, SDM, HCF, etc. Currently, he serves as a Senior Expert in Hollow Core Fiber at YOFC’s National Key Laboratory, spearheading innovations in next-generation optical fiber technologies. He and his team have published numerous articles in the field of hollow-core optical fibers, promoting the development of the industrialization of this technology.
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Brian Mangan
Lightera OFS Laboratories, United States
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Francesco Poletti
Microsoft Azure & AI, United Kingdom
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Giovanni Sticca
Politecnico di Milano, Italy
Giovanni Simone Sticca is a third-year Ph.D. student at Politecnico di Milano, working under the supervision of Prof. Massimo Tornatore. His research focuses on the cross-layer design of next-generation optical networks, with particular interest in multi-band transmission and in exploring the benefits and challenges of hollow-core fiber. He recently spent six months as a visiting Ph.D. student at the Optical Networks Group (ONG) led by Prof. Polina Bayvel at University College London, working on optical network topology design, and two months at IIJ Research Laboratories in Tokyo as a visiting researcher, investigating BGP security.
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Yingying Wang
Linfiber, China
Yingying Wang received her Ph.D degree from University of Bath, U.K, in 2011. In Nov. 2019, she joined Jinan University, Guangzhou as a Professor at the Institute of Photonics Technology, College of Physics & Optoelectronic Engineering. In Jan. 2024, she founded Linfiber Tech, which specializes in developing ultralow-loss hollow core fiber technology for the datacom and telecom industries. She has authored or co-authored more than 100 papers and delivered many invited and postdeadline talks in major conferences.
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Thierry Zami
Nokia, France
Thierry Zami is a WDM system engineer in Alcatel Submarine Network in France. He has been working in the field of optical fiber networking for 29 years, successively in Alcatel Alsthom Recherche, Alcatel-Lucent and Nokia. As a distinguished member of technical staff of Nokia Bell Labs, his expertise covers optical switching technology, optical routing node architecture in WDM fiber transport networks, and physical impairment-aware WDM network planning. He is presently involved in modelling, specification, and experimental assessment of advanced optical features for the Nokia WDM product line.