Serially Concatenated Codes for Data Center Networks

This work investigates channel code design for next-generation data center networks employing 448G/lane attachment unit interfaces (AUIs). A three-link problem, composed of an electrical, optical, and electrical link, representative of intra- and inter-data center links ranging from a few meters to a few kilometers, is considered. To address high error rates, serially concatenated Reed Solomon (RS) and Bose-Ray-Chaudhuri-Hocquenghem (BCH) codes, both located on the host chip, are proposed. The implementation complexity of different forward error correction (FEC) component codes is discussed, different decoding schemes are compared, and analytical and semi-analytical approximations of the error rates are presented.