Active feedback lightwave receivers

This paper describes new p-i-n-FET lightwave receivers that achieve high sensitivity without signal integration, and dynamic ranges large enough that they cannot be saturated by present lightwave transmitters. IC versions can be realized inexpensively in standard fine-line NMOS, CMOS, or GaAs IC technologies, and thus are suitable for loop-plant, local-area-network, and data link applications, as well as long-haul transmission applications. These receivers also can readily be designed for bit-rates in excess of 1 Gbit/s for high-capacity systems. In addition, these receivers can be implemented on the same IC as other system functions, e.g., for single-chip lightwave regenerators and lightwave modems, and, eventually, for microprocessors with on-chip optical communications ports.