Characterization of 1.55-μm pulses from a self-seeded gain-switched Fabry-Pérot laser diode using frequency-resolved optical gating

The intensity and frequency chirp of picosecond pulses from a self-seeded gain-switched Fabry-Perot laser diode have been directly measured using the technique of frequency-resolved optical gating. Measurements over an output sidemode suppression ratio (SMSR) range of 15-35 dB show that higher SMSR's are associated with an increasingly linear frequency chirp across the output pulses. This complete pulse characterization allows the conditions for optimum pulse compression to be determined accurately, and indicates that transform-limited, pedestal free pulses can be obtained at an SMSR of 35 dB

Characterization of 40-Gbit/s pulses generated using a lithium niobate modulator at 1550 nm using frequency resolved optical gating

The characteristics of 40-Gbit/s pulses generated by exploiting the nonlinear characteristics of a Mach-Zender Lithium Niobate modulator are presented. A high spectral resolution frequency resolved optical gating apparatus has been developed to allow for the complete characterization of the intensity and phase of these pulses. The use of these measurements to simplify the design and optimization of an 80-Gbit/s pulse source, based on this 40-Gbit/s source followed by a nonlinear fiber compressor and multiplexer, is also demonstrated

Optimization of optical data transmitters for 40-Gb/s lightwave systems using frequency resolved optical gating

The measurement technique of frequency resolved optical gating has been used to optimize the phase of a 40-GHz train of optical pulses generated using a continuous-wave laser gated with an external modulator. This technique will be vital for optimization of optical transmitters to be used in systems operating at 40 Gb/s and beyond, as standard measurement techniques will not suffice to optimize such high-speed systems

Complete characterization of ultrashort pulse sources at 1550 nm

This paper reviews the use of frequency-resolved optical gating (FROG) to characterize mode-locked lasers producing ultrashort pulses suitable for high-capacity optical communications systems at wavelengths around 1550 nm, Second harmonic generation (SHG) FROG is used to characterize pulses from a passively mode-locked erbium-doped fiber laser, and both single-mode and dual-mode gain-switched semiconductor lasers. The compression of gain-switched pulses in dispersion compensating fiber is also studied using SHG-FROG, allowing optimal compression conditions to be determined without a priori assumptions about pulse characteristics. We also describe a fiber-based FROG geometry exploiting cross-phase modulation and show that it is ideally suited to pulse characterization at optical communications wavelengths. This technique has been used to characterize picosecond pulses with energy as low as 24 pJ, giving results in excellent agreement with SHG-FROG characterization, and without any temporal ambiguity in the retrieved puls

Experimental study on receiver filtering effects in a spectrum-sliced incoherent light WDM system using SOA based noise reduction

We investigate optical filtering effects at the receiver in a spectrum-sliced WDM access system incorporating a gain saturated SOA. System performance is shown to have a strong dependence on the receiver filter bandwidth and shape

Spectrally-efficient 168 Gb/s/λ WDM 64-QAM single-sideband Nyquist-subcarrier modulation with Kramers-Kronig direct-detection receivers

Due to their simple and cost-effective transceiver architecture, single-polarization and single-photodiode based direct-detection (DD) systems offer advantages for metropolitan area network and data-center interconnect applications. Single-sideband subcarrier modulation (SSB SCM) signaling with direct detection has the potential to achieve high information spectral density (ISD) but its performance can be significantly degraded by signal-signal beat interference (SSBI). The recently proposed Kramers-Kronig (KK) digital signal processing (DSP) scheme is effective in eliminating the SSBI penalty. Through the use of the KK scheme, we achieved 4 × 168 Gb/s wavelength division multiplexing DD SSB 64-QAM Nyquist-SCM signal transmission over 80 km of uncompensated standard single-mode fiber at a net ISD of up to 4.61 (b/s)/Hz. The joint optimization of the optical carrier-to-signal power ratio (CSPR) and the KK algorithm sampling rate is described

DSP for single-sideband direct-detection systems

We review signal-signal beat interference mitigation techniques for direct-detection systems. Simulation and experiments have been carried out for ≥ 100 Gb/s/λ WDM systems transmitting over up to 160 km single-span SSMF

Amplification schemes and multi-channel DBP for unrepeatered transmission

The performance of unrepeatered transmission of a seven Nyquist-spaced 10 GBd PDM-16QAM superchannel using full signal band coherent detection and multi-channel digital back propagation (MC-DBP) to mitigate nonlinear effects is analysed. For the first time in unrepeatered transmission, the performance of two amplification systems is investigated and directly compared in terms of achievable information rates (AIRs): 1) erbium-doped fibre amplifier (EDFA) and 2) second-order bidirectional Raman pumped amplification. The experiment is performed over different span lengths, demonstrating that, for an AIR of 6.8 bit/s/Hz, the Raman system enables an increase of 93 km (36 %) in span length. Further, at these distances, MC-DBP gives an improvement in AIR of 1 bit/s/Hz (to 7.8 bit/s/Hz) for both amplification schemes. The theoretical AIR gains for Raman and MC-DBP are shown to be preserved when considering low-density parity-check codes. Additionally, MC-DBP algorithms for both amplification schemes are compared in terms of performance and computational complexity. It is shown that to achieve the maximum MC-DBP gain, the Raman system requires approximately four times the computational complexity due to the distributed impact of fibre nonlinearity

Experimental Analysis of Nonlinear Impairments in Fibre Optic Transmission Systems up to 7.3 THz

An effective way of increasing the overall optical fibre capacity is by expanding the bandwidth used to transmit signals. In this paper, the impact of expanding the transmission bandwidth on the optical communication system is experimentally studied using the achievable rates as a performance metric. The trade-offs between the use of larger bandwidths and higher nonlinear interference (NLI) noise is experimentally and theoretically analysed. The growth of NLI noise is investigated for spectral bandwidths from 40 GHz up to 7.3 THz using 64-QAM and Nyquist pulse-shaping. Experimental results are shown to be in line with the predictions from the Gaussian- Noise model showing a logarithmic growth in NLI noise as the signal bandwidth is extended. A reduction of the information rate of only 10% was found between linear and non-linear transmission across several transmission bandwidths, all the way up to 7.3 THz. Finally, the power transfer between channels due to stimulated Raman scattering effect is analysed showing up to 2 dB power tilt at optimum power for the largest transmitted bandwidth of 7.3 THz