100G shortwave wavelength division multiplexing solutions for multimode fiber data links

We investigate an alternative 100G solution for optical short-range data center links. The presented solution adopts wavelength division multiplexing technology to transmit four channels of 25G over a multimode fiber. A comparative performance analysis of the wavelength-grid selection for the wavelength division multiplexing data link is reported. The analysis includes transmissions over standard optical multimode fiber (OM): OM2, OM3 and OM4

200 Gbps/lane IM/DD Technologies for Short Reach Optical Interconnects

Client-side optics are facing an ever-increasing upgrading pace, driven by upcoming 5G related services and datacenter applications. The demand for a single lane data rate is soon approaching 200 Gbps. To meet such high-speed requirement, all segments of traditional intensity modulation direct detection (IM/DD) technologies are being challenged. The characteristics of electrical and optoelectronic components and the performance of modulation, coding, and digital signal processing (DSP) techniques are being stretched to their limits. In this context, we witnessed technological breakthroughs in several aspects, including development of broadband devices, novel modulation formats and coding, and high-performance DSP algorithms for the past few years. A great momentum has been accumulated to overcome the aforementioned challenges. In this article, we focus on IM/DD transmissions, and provide an overview of recent research and development efforts on key enabling technologies for 200 Gbps per lane and beyond. Our recent demonstrations of 200 Gbps short-reach transmissions with 4-level pulse amplitude modulation (PAM) and discrete multitone signals are also presented as examples to show the system requirements in terms of device characteristics and DSP performance. Apart from digital coherent technologies and advanced direct detection systems, such as Stokes–vector and Kramers–Kronig schemes, we expect high-speed IM/DD systems will remain advantageous in terms of system cost, power consumption, and footprint for short reach applications in the short- to mid- term perspective

Advances in local area optical data communication systems

This paper reviews optical fibre technology for local area optical communications systems. Technologies used in local systems include single and multimode fibre, single and multimode lasers, optical modulators, photodetectors, wavelength division multiplexing, multilevel modulation formats, electronic packet switching, electronic equalization and error correction. These methods have enabled the local area optical link data rate to increase from 0.1 Gb/s in 1990 to nearly a Tb/s in 2019. The challenges to increasing link data rates further, whilst reducing the transmitted power per bit, at reduced cost are discussed. Potential technical solutions and newly proposed methods which might address these challenges are highlighted

Advanced high speed data and clock transmission over optical fibre for square kilometre telescope array

There is an ever present need from Internet users for more bandwidth. This is manifested by continuous increase in bandwidth demanding applications such as 5G wireless, new end user consumer links like thunderbolt, video conferencing, high definition video-on-demand transmitted over the Internet and massive data transfers required with and within data centres for backup, storage and data processing in cloud computing. Fibre optic communications technologies are playing a pivotal role in communication, being a major enabling technology in our increasingly Internet-centric society. As network services continue to become more dynamic and diverse, Internet service providers are faced with a challenge of cost reduction in the transmission network, power and spectral efficiency as well as scalability of the optical network infrastructure to support incremental expansions and virtual machines. Intelligent design of terrestrial optical networks to allow for simultaneous signal transmission through shared network infrastructure, and the use of low cost, power efficient, high bandwidth transmitters such as vertical surface emitting lasers (VCSELs) as well as exploitation of spectral efficient in-complex advanced modulation formats is a viable approach to this situation. In this study, techniques for spectral efficiency upgrade and simultaneous transmission of data signal, reference frequency (RF) clock signal and pulse-per-second (PPS) over shared infrastructure have experimentally been optimized in a laboratory environment for adoption in next-generation telescope array networks such as the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), time keeping systems such as banking systems, Coordinated Universal Time(UTC) timing and Global Positioning Systems (GPS), as well as high capacity spectral efficient short reach optical fibre networks such as data centres. This work starts by experimentally optimizing VCSEL technology for simultaneous transmission of 10 Gbps data and 1.712 GHz RF clock signal over a single G. 655 optical fibre of length 24.75 Km at different channel spacing and different propagation direction for implementation in a cost effective next-generation telescope array network. The wavelength tuneability property of VCSEL transmitters allows for wavelength adjustment, a key requirement for simultaneous data and RF clock signal transmission over a single optical fibre. A receiver sensitivity of -19.19 dBm was experimentally achieved at back-to-back analysis. A 24.75 Km of simultaneous data and RF clock signal transmission performed at 0.4 nm channel spacing introduced a transmission penalty of 1.07 dB and 1.63 dB for counter and co-propagation scheme respectively. This work mainly utilized direct modulation and direct detection using a positive intrinsic negative (PIN) due to its simplicity and cost effectiveness. A novel modulation technique for simultaneous data and polarization-based pulse-per-second timing clock signal transmission using a single VCSEL carrier is experimentally demonstrated. Two signal types, a directly modulated 10 Gbps data signal and a polarization-based pulse per second (PPS) clock signal are modulated onto a single mode 10 GHz bandwidth VCSEL carrier at 1310 nm. Spectral efficiency is maximized by exploiting the inherent orthogonal polarization switching of the xiv VCSEL with changing bias in transmission of the PPS signal. A 10 Gbps VCSEL transmission with PPS over 11 Km of G.652 fibre introduced a transmission penalty of 0.52 dB. The contribution of PPS clock signal to this penalty was found to be 0.08 dB. A technique for simultaneous directly modulated data and phase modulated reference clock signal transmission over a signal channel in wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) solutions is experimentally demonstrated. This is to prepare solutions to the ever-increasing demand over gigabit/s, terabit/s and gigahertz capacities in WDM-based terrestrial optical fibre transmission systems such as telescope array networks. a total capacity of 30 Gbps (310 Gbps) data and 12 GHz ( 4 3 GHz) reference clock signal are multiplexed at a channel spacing of 100 GHz and simultaneously transmitted over a single mode G.655 fibre of length 24.73 Km. The recovery of the phase modulated RF clock signal using a differential delay line interferometry technique is experimentally demonstrated. A 625 Gbps (2525 Gbps) DWDM data transmission system is further implemented in simulation by multiplexing 25 channels at 25 Gbps per channel using 50 GHz channel spacing. A four level pulse amplitude modulation (4-PAM) data modulation format employing VCSELs is experimentally demonstrated for adoption in high bitrate networks such as big data science projects and data centre networks. 4-PAM offers a good trade-off between complexity, efficiency, reach, and sensitivity. A software defined digital signal processing (DSP) receiver is designed and implemented in MATLAB to recover the transmitted 4-PAM data signal cost effectively without the necessity of costly receiver hardware. A novel technique for maximizing carrier spectral efficiency through simultaneous 20 Gbps 4-PAM data and phase modulated 2 GHz RF clock signal transmission on a single mode 10 GHz bandwidth VCSEL carrier at 1310 nm is experimentally demonstrated for the first time to the best of our knowledge. Data transmission and clock stability performance of the designed high spectral efficient VCSEL-based link network is evaluated through BER curve plots, phase noise measurements and Allan variance analysis respectively. VCSEL-based Raman amplification is experimentally demonstrated as a viable approach for RF clock signal distribution in extended reach astronomical telescope array networks and other extended reach terrestrial optical fibre network application. This is achieved by adopting two pumping techniques namely forward pumping and backward pumping. A maximum on off gain of 5.7 dB and 1.5 dB was experimentally attained for forward pumping and backward pumping at 24 dBm pump power respectively, while a maximum 100.8 Km fibre transmission achieved experimentally. In summary, this study has successfully demonstrated in-complex, spectral efficient, low cost and power efficient simultaneous data signal, reference frequency (RF) clock signal and pulse-per-second (PPS) transmission techniques over shared network infrastructure. Simultaneous transmission of data, RF clock and PPS timing signal is relevant in nextgeneration telescope array networks such as the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), time keeping systems such as banking systems, Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) timing and Global Positioning Systems (GPS), as well as high capacity spectral efficient short reach optical fibre networks such as data centres

Modulation of coherently coupled surface-emitting laser arrays: analysis and applications

Vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) have become the dominant source for optical data communication links in computer server, data center, and super computer applications. Driven by the exponential increase of performance in information technology, data centers, and computational power, data transmission bandwidth is required to increase exponentially as well. Furthermore, as data centers become physically larger, utilizing more interconnects and requiring longer rack-to-rack fiber transmission distance, low power consumption and narrow spectral width for reduced signal dispersion become increasingly important. This work discusses the development of phased, ion-implanted, PhC VCSEL arrays for coherently coupled operation and modulation bandwidth enhancement with narrow spectral width emission. In this dissertation, monolithic mutual optical injection locking induced laser dynamics in phased, coherently coupled implant-defined PhC VCSEL arrays are investigated in detail both theoretically and experimentally. A model based on the well-established injection-locking laser rate equations is used to intuitively explain the physics of various experimental phenomena. An operation procedure, in which current isolation and bias conditions are leveraged to control array index profile and coupling phase, is developed to achieve coherently coupled operation of the phased VCSEL arrays reproducibly with high yield. An experimental study on the modulation characteristics and locking range dynamics of coherently coupled VCSEL arrays is conducted, showing significant improvements in operational procedures, performance, and device manufacturing. A record VCSEL 3 dB bandwidth of 37 GHz (receiver limited) is obtained under highly single-mode coherent operation with narrow spectral width and increased output power while the laser array is biased at low current density. Additionally, this result has been duplicated by multiple devices, under coherently coupled operation in either the in-phase or out-of-phase mode. Bandwidth enhancement beyond 30 GHz has been shown to be reproducible for several different photonic crystal patterns, and bias conditions for bandwidth enhancement have been shown to be stable and reproducible for the same device design across the sample

OPTICAL ACCESS NETWORKS BASED ON 1.5-?m VCSELS

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH

VCSEL Cavity Engineering for High Speed Modulation and Silicon Photonics Integration

The GaAs-based vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) is the standard light source in today\u27s optical interconnects, due to its energy efficiency, low cost, and high speed already at low drive currents. The latest commercial VCSELs operate at data rates of up to 28 Gb/s, but it is expected that higher speeds will be required in the near future.One important parameter for the speed is the damping of the relaxation oscillations. A higher damping is affordable at low data rates to reduce signal degradation due to overshoot and jitter, while lower damping is required to reach higher data rates. A VCSEL with the damping optimized for high data rates enabled error-free transmission at record-high data rates up to 57 Gb/s.For future interconnect links it is of interest with tighter integration between the optics and the silicon-based electronics. Techniques to heterogeneously integrate GaAs-based VCSELs on silicon could potentially enable integrated multi-wavelength VCSEL arrays, thus increasing the data rate through wavelength division multiplexing. Heterogeneous integration of GaAs-based VCSELs would also benefit applications that need short-wavelength light sources, such as photonic integrated circuits for life sciences and bio photonics. Silicon-integrated short-wavelength hybrid-cavity VCSELs with up to 2.3 mW optical output power and 12 GHz modulation bandwidth, which enables data transmission at up to 25 Gb/s, are demonstrated by employing ultra-thin adhesive bonding. Further, a vertical-cavity silicon-integrated laser (VCSIL) with in-plane waveguide emission is demonstrated by employing an intra-cavity waveguide with a weak diffraction grating that couples light from the standing wave in the vertical cavity into an in-plane waveguide