Introduction to the JOCN special issue on machine learning and data analytics for optical communications and networking

This Special Issue contains a collection of outstanding papers covering several applications of machine learning in optical communications and networking, including: Resource management in elastic optical networks, datacenters and ROADM-based networks; noise and signalquality estimation; and traffic prediction. We provide a brief overview of the current state of machine learning in optical networks, followed by a categorization of the eleven papers in this special issue.