Title :
Dynamic birefringence of the linear optical amplifier and application in optical regeneration
Author :
Zhao, Mingshan ; De Merlier, Jan ; Morthier, Geert ; Baets, Roel G.
Author_Institution :
Dept. of Inf. Technol., Ghent Univ. IMEC, Gent, Belgium
Abstract :
Dynamic birefringence of the linear optical amplifier (LOA) is theoretically and experimentally investigated. Significant nonlinear variations of the state of polarization with the input power and bias current of the LOA have been found. Based on this nonlinear change of the state of polarization, an all-optical 2R regenerator is demonstrated. Under static operation, an extinction ratio (ER) improvement of 15 dB has been obtained for an input ER of 5 dB. With a degraded input signal, a receiver sensitivity improvement of over 3 dB at a bit-error rate (BER) of 10-9 has been found for 2.5 Gb/s. For 10 Gb/s, zero power penalty is observed. Significant improvements of ER for both 2.5 and 10 Gb/s are obtained.
Keywords :
birefringence; light polarisation; optical receivers; optical repeaters; semiconductor optical amplifiers; sensitivity; 10 Gbit/s; 2.5 Gbit/s; all-optical 2R regenerator; bias current; bit-error rate; degraded input signal; dynamic birefringence; linear amplification; linear optical amplifier; nonlinear change; nonlinear variations; optical regeneration; receiver sensitivity; semiconductor optical amplifier; state of polarization; zero power penalty; Birefringence; Erbium; Nonlinear optics; Optical amplifiers; Optical polarization; Optical receivers; Optical sensors; Repeaters; Semiconductor optical amplifiers; Stimulated emission;
Journal_Title :
Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics, IEEE Journal of
DOI :
10.1109/JSTQE.2002.806694
