US Patent 8718482 Transparent clock for precision timing distribution

One or more devices of a network having asymmetric delay are configured to participate in time synchronization protocol sessions in which a client device synchronizes its local clock to a master device. In one example, a system includes an optical line terminal configured to receive a time synchronization protocol packet from a grandmaster clock and an optical network unit (ONU) configured to calculate a residence time of the time synchronization protocol packet, encode the residence time into the packet, and to forward the packet to a client device. Moreover, the system may participate in a plurality of time synchronization protocol sessions with a plurality of client devices, such that the client devices become synchronized in frequency and phase.