On improving the computational efficiency of digital lightwave link simulation

Author

Townsend, J. Keith ; Shanmugan, K. Sam

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. & Comput. Eng., North Carolina State Univ., Raleigh, NC, USA

Volume

38

Issue

11

fYear

1990

fDate

11/1/1990 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

2040

Lastpage

2048

Abstract

Monte Carlo simulation can be used to estimate the bit error rate (BER) in digital lightwave communication links. However, when the link includes an avalanche photodetector (APD) receiver and is operating at a low BER, Monte Carlo simulation requires excessive execution time unless assumptions are made about the APD statistics. Techniques are presented that reduce the computational resources required to estimate the BER for these systems by two orders of magnitude. The speed-up is achieved by developing anew, more efficient random number generation algorithm for APD shot noise and by applying a tail extrapolation technique to the conditional distributions at the sample-and-decide input in the receiver. Receiver thermal noise is handled analytically. Accurate BER estimates for an NRZ direct-detection system are obtained in approximately 1.5 CPU hours on a VAXstation II using a combination of these techniques

Keywords

Monte Carlo methods; avalanche photodiodes; optical links; random noise; thermal noise; APD receiver; APD shot noise; BER; Monte Carlo simulation; NRZ direct-detection system; avalanche photodetector; bit error rate; computational efficiency; digital lightwave link simulation; random number generation algorithm; sample-and-decide input; tail extrapolation; thermal noise; Analytical models; Bit error rate; Computational efficiency; Computational modeling; Gaussian noise; Intersymbol interference; Noise generators; Optical noise; Photodetectors; Statistics;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Communications, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0090-6778

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/26.61486

Filename

61486