Philip Ji is a Senior Researcher in the Optical Networking and Sensing Department at NEC Laboratories America, where he has been researching optical switching, networking, and sensing technologies since 2001. He received his B.E., M.E., and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering & Telecommunications from the University of New South Wales (UNSW), where he focused on special polymer optical fiber and fiber optic device innovation.
His research interests include fiber optic sensing, WDM switching node and network architecture, fiber optic devices for communication, high-speed and high-capacity optical transmission, optical interconnects for the data center, and special optical fiber. Dr. Ji’s current research at NEC centers on the design and optimization of distributed fiber optic sensors and high-capacity optical networking technologies, with a focus on metro-access integration, network virtualization, and software-defined networking (SDN). He develops scalable, energy-efficient architectures that enable greater agility and automation in optical networks.
His work addresses key challenges in elastic bandwidth allocation, resource abstraction, and control-plane programmability, supporting the transition toward fully programmable, converged metro and access infrastructures. He leads initiatives that advance virtualization of transport resources and dynamic service provisioning, helping telecom and enterprise networks respond to rapidly shifting traffic patterns and service demands. His research contributes to the evolution of next-generation optical networks that are flexible, cost-effective, and ready for future application-driven architectures.
Posts
NEC Laboratories America is bringing a strong research presence to ECOC 2026, the European Conference on Optical Communications in Málaga, Spain. Researchers from the Optical Communications & Computing and Optical Sensing & Solutions departments will present papers, posters, and workshop talks covering underwater acoustic sensing, power-efficient submarine cable design, earthquake and tsunami monitoring through telecom fiber, and forward-transmission fiber sensing.
NEC Laboratories America has formed two new departments from its Optical Networking and Sensing group. Optical Communications and Computing, led by Yue-Kai Huang, and Optical Sensing and Solutions, led by Yue Tian, will carry the lab’s photonics research into new territory.
NEC Laboratories America will receive a 2026 Edison Patent Award for a patent that lets optical fiber carry both data communications and distributed sensing at once, reducing interference through counter-propagation and standard WDM filtering, validated across long distances of field fiber.
We propose a rapid state-of-polarization disturbance change-point detection and localization method using lossy coding length of kernel features. Field experiments validateaccurate detection of subtle changes and precise localization, enabling reliable fiber identification and monitoring.
We propose to jointly optimize path and gateway selection to achieve load balancing for mobile orbital domain-based hierarchical routing in satellite networks. The load at bottleneck gateway satellites can be reduced by 22% on average.
We present field trial on urban monitoring over telecom networks using Rayleigh-based distributed temperature/ strain sensor (DTSS), showing the capability of detecting subtle infrastructure signatures including manhole locations, road traffic, sprinklers and underground leakage events.
We demonstrate a low-cost wavelength selectable distributed vibration sensor to monitor the whole routes in a 1×32 PON architecture with a unified sensitivity. The results obtained from the lab and a field testbed are presented.
NEC Laboratories America is proud to participate in OECC 2026, the 31st Opto-Electronics and Communications Conference, taking place in Busan, South Korea. We look forward to connecting with the international photonics and communications community and sharing the work we’re doing to shape the next generation of optical networks.
We propose a mobile orbital domain-based hierarchical routing scheme which addresses the challenges posed by constant satellite movement and the resulting dynamicnetwork topology, thus significantly improving the routing scalability and efficiency in satellite networks.
NEC Laboratories America’s Optical Networking & Sensing team will participate in OFC 2026 in Los Angeles, March 15–19, contributing to panels, workshops, and courses focused on optical sensing, multicore fibers, and next-generation high-capacity optical communication systems.
