optical carrier (Sonet) (OC)
Optical Carrier (OC) refers to the basic bit rate of the North American Sonet hierarchy Synchronous Transport Signal( STS-n). The basic bit rate OC-1 is 51.84 Mbit/s and corresponds to STS-1.
The multiples of the basic bit rate are designated OC-3, OC-9, OC-12, OC-18, OC-24, OC-36, and OC-48 and correspond to multiplication by the basic bit rate of 51.840 Mbit/s. Thus, OC-3 has a transmission rate of 155.520 Mbit/s, OC-9 of 466.560 Mbit/s, OC-12 of 622.08 Mbit/s, OC-18 of 933.120 Mbit/s, OC-24 of 1.244 Gbit/s, OC-36 of 1,866 Gbps, OC-48 of 2.488 Gbps, OC-96 of 4.976 Gbps, OC-192 of 9.953 Gbps, OC-768 of 39.81312 Gbps, OC-1536 of about 80 Gbps, and OC-3072 of about 160 Gbps.