Abstract: A temperature compensation mechanism and associated methodology to provide compensation for temperature-induced drifts in the peak transmission wavelength of a liquid crystal (LC)-based tunable optical filter stage. The filter-staged based methodology uses a simple, empirical mathematical relationship that represents thermal effects on a liquid crystal-based filter stage by taking into account a relationship among the LC material's actual temperature coefficient (of thermal expansion), the operating temperature variation, and wavelength drift attributable to the temperature variation. In one embodiment, a control channel based mechanism is used to provides appropriate temperature compensation to a liquid crystal-based tunable optical filter by accurately calculating LC driving voltage values needed for temperature compensation and then supplying the calculated drive voltage to drive various LC components in the filter.