We present a simple yet effective enhancement to the operation of the EPON multipoint control protocol (MPCP) that results in significant performance gains across the whole range of traffic loads. The enhancement, inspired by our earlier work in a related but different context, allows the OLT to perform look-ahead scheduling on the upstream channel. The look-ahead operation is fully compatible with the existing standard, and may be implemented via software updates to the OLT without affecting the operation of ONUs. In addition to improvements in delay and throughput performance, look-ahead enhanced MPCP also opens up new opportunities for the design of sophisticated DBA algorithms to support advanced quality of service (QoS) capabilities.
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