Demonstration of 5.1 Tbit/s data capacity on a single-wavelength channel

Reconfigurable and real-time high-bandwidth Nyquist signal detection with low-bandwidth in silicon photonics

We demonstrate for the first time, to the best of our knowledge, reconfigurable and real-time orthogonal time-domain detection of a high-bandwidth Nyquist signal with a low-bandwidth silicon photonics Mach-Zehnder modulator based receiver. As the Nyquist signal has a rectangular bandwidth, it can be multiplexed in the wavelength domain without any guardband as a part of a Nyquist-WDM superchannel. These superchannels can be additionally multiplexed in space and polarization. Thus, the presented demonstration can open a new possibility for the detection of multidimensional parallel data signals with silicon photonics. No external pulse source is needed for the receiver, and frequency-time coherence is used to sample the incoming Nyquist signal with orthogonal sinc-shaped Nyquist pulse sequences. All parameters are completely tunable in the electrical domain. The feasibility of the scheme is demonstrated through a proof-of-concept experiment over the entire C-band (1530 nm-1560 nm), employing a 24 Gbaud Nyquist QPSK signal due to experimental constraints on the transmitter side electronics. However, the silicon Mach-Zehnder modulator with a 3-dB bandwidth of only 16 GHz can process Nyquist signals of 90 GHz optical bandwidth, suggesting a possibility to detect symbol rates up to 90 GBd in an integrated Nyquist receiver.

A New Suppression approach of FWM Crosstalk Effect in Optical Communication Link based on Polarization combiner Method

To meet the growing needs of internet data, optical communication systems have become the backbone of modern communications networks. At the present time, the dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) technique has been used to increase the number of channels, but the nonlinear effects have a great impact that limits the performance of doubling the DWDM system. The four wave mixing (FWM) is the most harmful and dangerous as the effect of FWM increases on the system the greater the optical connection distances. The new approach of pairing groups of different optical signals was investigated to suppress the FWM effect. The simulation was conducted for an 8-channel system with a total data rate (80Gb/s). A comparative study was conducted on the suppression of FWM by the difference in the power inputs (-0.5 to 20) dBm. The robustness of the proposed technique was examined using two forms of modulation (Carrier Suppressed Return to Zero (CSRZ) and Duo Binary Modulation class -1(DBM-1)) techniques, with optical fiber system of (1,2,5) spans, each of length 60 Km, with spacing between the channels 50GHz. The power of FWM was significantly reduced with the CSRZ & DBM-1 techniques to less than (47.97%, 41.38 %) respectively, at an input power of 12.5 dBm. The performance of the proposed system with the polarization technique was improved by the rate of the quality factor (Q-factor of (91.59%, 78.67%) for the same sequence of modulation.

Carving out configurable ultrafast pulses from a continuous wave source via the optical Kerr effect

Wavelength-tunable, time-locked pairs of ultrafast pulses are crucial in modern-day time-resolved measurements. We demonstrate a simple means of generating configurable optical pulse sequences: sub-picosecond pulses are carved out from a continuous wave laser via pump-induced optical Kerr switching in 10 cm of a commercial single-mode fiber. By introducing dispersion to the pump, the near transform-limited switched pulse duration is tuned between 305-570 fs. Two- and four-pulse signal trains are also generated by adding birefringent α-BBO plates in the pump beam. These results highlight an ultrafast light source with intrinsic timing stability and pulse-to-pulse phase coherence, where pulse generation could be adapted to wavelengths ranging from ultraviolet to infrared.

Single-channel 10.2 Tbit/s (2.56 Tbaud) optical Nyquist pulse transmission over 300 km

We describe a single-channel 10.2 Tbit/s online transmission using non-coherent ultrashort optical Nyquist pulses. A 10.2 Tbit/s signal was generated at a symbol rate of as fast as 2.56 Tbaud with a polarization-multiplexed DQPSK format. We developed a new ultrafast optical sampler for Nyquist OTDM demultiplexing with a nonlinear optical loop mirror, an RZ-CW conversion technique to improve the SNR, and an active stabilization technique providing stable long-term demultiplexing operation. With precise higher-order dispersion compensation up to fourth order, a 10.2 Tbit/s signal was transmitted over 300 km for the first time as a real-time demonstration with a spectral efficiency of 2.5 bit/s/Hz. We also report a 10.2 Tbit/s transmission over 225 km with a spectral efficiency of 3.7 bit/s/Hz, which we realized by reducing the roll-off factor to zero.

Pedestal-free 25-GHz subpicosecond optical pulse source for 16 × 25-Gb/s OTDM based on phase modulation and dual-stage nonlinear compression

An optical pulse generation scheme based on an ultra-short chirped seed pulse generator followed by a dual-stage fiber-based nonlinear pulse processing stage is proposed and demonstrated experimentally. After phase modulation and linear-chirp compensation, optical seed pulse with a duty cycle of 9.8% and an obvious pedestal is obtained. By soliton compression and Mamyshev reshaping, a pedestal-free optical pulse with a duty cycle of 2% and an extinction ratio of 27 dB is achieved. The optical pulse source is further applied in a 16×25-Gb/s on-off keying optical time-division multiplexing transmitter.

All-optical retro-modulation for free-space optical communication

This work presents device and system architectures for free-space optical and optical wireless communication at high data rates over multidirectional links. This is particularly important for all-optical networks, with high data rates, low latencies, and network protocol transparency, and for asymmetrical networks, with multidirectional links from one transceiver to multiple distributed transceivers. These two goals can be met by implementing a passive uplink via all-optical retro-modulation (AORM), which harnesses the optical power from an active downlink to form a passive uplink through retroreflection. The retroreflected optical power is modulated all-optically to ideally achieve terabit-per-second data rates. The proposed AORM architecture, for passive uplinks, uses high-refractive-index S-LAH79 hemispheres to realize effective retroreflection and an interior semiconductor thin film of CuO nanocrystals to realize ultrafast all-optical modulation on a timescale of approximately 770 fs. The AORM architecture is fabricated and tested, and ultimately shown to be capable of enabling multidirectional free-space optical communication with terabit-per-second aggregate data rates.

Single-channel 5.12 Tbit/s (1.28 Tbaud) DQPSK transmission over 300 km using non-coherent Nyquist pulses

We present a single-channel 5.12 Tbit/s polarization-multiplexed DQPSK transmission over 300 km at 1.28 Tbaud using a non-coherent Nyquist pulse. An ultrafast OTDM demultiplexer for 1.28 Tbaud Nyquist pulses was newly developed with a mode-locked fiber laser operating in the L band as a control pulse source. Thanks to the high PMD tolerance of Nyquist pulses, a 300 km transmission was successfully demonstrated for the first time at such a high symbol rate.

Roll-off factor dependence of Nyquist pulse transmission

We evaluate the dependence of system performance on the roll-off factor, α, of a Nyquist pulse in a single-channel 1.28 Tbit/s-525 km transmission both experimentally and analytically. Low α values are preferable in terms of spectral efficiency and tolerance to chromatic dispersion and polarization-mode dispersion, while a strong overlap with neighboring symbols results in larger nonlinear impairments. On the other hand, a Nyquist pulse with high α values also suffers from nonlinearity due to higher peak power. As a result, we found experimentally that the optimum α value is 0.4~0.6, which agrees well with the analysis.

Mode locking theory of the Nyquist laser

We derive a master equation for a mode-locked Nyquist laser that can emit a sinc function pulse. To derive the master equation, we used a method involving exponential perturbative expressions for gain, loss, and amplitude modulation, and a flat-top optical filter with edge enhancement. The master equation is expressed as an integral equation, where a rectangular-like optical filter with edge enhancement plays an important role in generating a sinc function pulse with a flat-top spectral profile. It is important to note that the sinc function solution satisfies the spherical wave propagation of the Maxwell equation in the polar axis and is also the lowest order solution of the spherical Bessel equation. A differential equation was introduced as an operator into the master equation, which is different from the substitution of an assumed sinc function solution into the master equation, and we directly derived a sinc function solution. The time-independent Schrödinger equation approach in the spectral domain also proved that there is a sinc-like solution under a dual flat potential well.

Q-factor analysis of nonlinear impairments in ultrahigh-speed Nyquist pulse transmission

We present detailed analytical and numerical results of the dispersion and nonlinear tolerances of RZ and Nyquist optical pulses in ultrahigh-speed TDM transmissions. From a Q-map analysis, i.e. by numerically calculating the Q-factor distribution as a function of transmission power and fiber dispersion, we found that Nyquist TDM transmission has a substantially larger Q margin as regards both dispersion and optical power thanks to ISI-free overlapped TDM. We also show that the optimum transmission power for Nyquist pulses is 2 dB lower than for RZ pulses. An analytical model is provided to explain the overlap-induced nonlinear impairments in Nyquist TDM transmission in a high power regime, which agrees well with numerical results.

2.56 Tbit/s/ch (640 Gbaud) polarization-multiplexed DQPSK non-coherent Nyquist pulse transmission over 525 km

We demonstrate a single-channel 2.56 Tbit/s polarization-multiplexed DQPSK transmission using 640 Gbaud non-coherent optical Nyquist pulses. By virtue of a large tolerance to polarization-mode dispersion, the detrimental depolarization-induced crosstalk was reduced by 3.8 dB compared with RZ pulses. As a result, the transmission distance was substantially extended to 525 km compared with the distance of 300 km obtained with a Gaussian pulse.

Ultrafast Nyquist OTDM demultiplexing using optical Nyquist pulse sampling in an all-optical nonlinear switch

We propose the ultrahigh-speed demultiplexing of Nyquist OTDM signals using an optical Nyquist pulse as both a signal and a sampling pulse in an all-optical nonlinear switch. The narrow spectral width of the Nyquist pulses means that the spectral overlap between data and control pulses is greatly reduced, and the control pulse itself can be made more tolerant to dispersion and nonlinear distortions inside the nonlinear switch. We apply the Nyquist control pulse to the 640 to 40 Gbaud demultiplexing of DPSK and DQPSK signals using a nonlinear optical loop mirror (NOLM), and demonstrate a large performance improvement compared with conventional Gaussian control pulses. We also show that the optimum spectral profile of the Nyquist control pulse depends on the walk-off property of the NOLM.

Optical Nyquist pulse generation using a time lens with spectral slicing

Optical Nyquist pulse generation based on a time lens with subsequent optical filtering is proposed. A nearly chirp-free 10-GHz 8.1-ps Nyquist pulse generator is experimentally demonstrated. By inserting group velocity dispersion (GVD) between cascaded phase and amplitude modulators, 11 tones ultraflat optical frequency comb (OFC) of 10-GHz frequency spacing within 0.9 dB power variation is obtained. The quasi-rectangular shape spectrum is then filtered out with a tunable rectangular-shaped optical band-pass filter (OBPF) and the quasi-linear chirp is compensated by a segment of standard single mode fiber (SSMF). By changing the wavelength of the continuous wave (CW) light, nearly chirp-free Nyquist pulses over C band are obtained. Furthermore, simultaneous dual-wavelength pulse generation is also demonstrated.

Potentials and challenges of using orbital angular momentum communications in optical interconnects

Ultra-short- and short-reach optical interconnects are the new high growth applications for optical communications. High capacity density, high spectral efficiency, low cost, low power consumption, and fast configurability are some of the key requirements for potential optical transmission technology candidates. Based on recent progress in orbital angular momentum multiplexed optical transmission and optical device technologies, this paper discusses the potentials and challenges of using orbital angular momentum multiplexing in optical interconnect applications scenarios to meet above requirements.

Fiber optical parametric amplifiers in optical communication systems

The prospects for using fiber optical parametric amplifiers (OPAs) in optical communication systems are reviewed. Phase-insensitive amplifiers (PIAs) and phase-sensitive amplifiers (PSAs) are considered. Low-penalty amplification at/or near 1 Tb/s has been achieved, for both wavelength- and time-division multiplexed formats. High-quality mid-span spectral inversion has been demonstrated at 0.64 Tb/s, avoiding electronic dispersion compensation. All-optical amplitude regeneration of amplitude-modulated signals has been performed, while PSAs have been used to demonstrate phase regeneration of phase-modulated signals. A PSA with 1.1-dB noise figure has been demonstrated, and preliminary wavelength-division multiplexing experiments have been performed with PSAs. 512 Gb/s have been transmitted over 6,000 km by periodic phase conjugation. Simulations indicate that PIAs could reach data rate x reach products in excess of 14,000 Tb/s × km in realistic wavelength-division multiplexed long-haul networks. Technical challenges remaining to be addressed in order for fiber OPAs to become useful for long-haul communication networks are discussed. [Formula: see text].

Optical data exchange of m-QAM signals using a silicon-organic hybrid slot waveguide: proposal and simulation

We present modulation-format-transparent data exchange for m-ary quadrature amplitude modulation (m-QAM) signals using a single silicon-organic hybrid slot waveguide which offers tight light confinement and enhanced nonlinearity. By exploiting the parametric depletion effect of non-degenerate four-wave mixing (ND-FWM) process in the slot waveguide, we simulate low-power (<10 mW) ultrahigh-speed optical data exchange of 640 Gbaud (2.56 Tbit/s) optical time-division multiplexed (OTDM) 16-QAM and 640 Gbaud (3.84 Tbit/s) OTDM 64-QAM signals and characterize the operation performance in terms of error vector magnitude (EVM) and bit-error rate (BER). The calculated signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) penalties of data exchange are negligible for 2.56 Tbit/s 16-QAM signals and less than 2 dB for 3.84 Tbit/s 64-QAM signals at a BER of 2e-3. For a given pump power of 9 mW, the operation performance dependence on the waveguide length is studied, showing an optimized waveguide length of ~17 mm. For a given waveguide length of 17 mm, the SNR penalty of data exchange, at a BER of 2e-3, is kept below 4 dB when varying input pump power from 8.4 to 9.8 mW for 2.56 Tbit/s 16-QAM and from 8.9 to 9.2 mW for 3.84 Tbit/s 64-QAM. In addition, data exchange running at low speed (e.g. 20 Gbaud) and data exchange taking into account waveguide propagation loss are also analyzed with favorable operation performance.

320 Gb/s Nyquist OTDM received by polarization-insensitive time-domain OFT

We have demonstrated the generation of a 320 Gb/s Nyquist-OTDM signal by rectangular filtering on an RZ-OTDM signal with the filter bandwidth (320 GHz) equal to the baud rate (320 Gbaud) and the reception of such a Nyquist-OTDM signal using polarization-insensitive time-domain optical Fourier transformation (TD-OFT) followed by passive filtering. After the time-to-frequency mapping in the TD-OFT, the Nyquist-OTDM signal with its characteristic sinc-shaped time-domain trace is converted into an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) signal with sinc-shaped spectra for each subcarrier. The subcarrier frequency spacing of the converted OFDM signal is designed to be larger than the transform-limited case, here 10 times greater than the symbol rate of each subcarrier. Therefore, only passive filtering is needed to extract the subcarriers of the converted OFDM signal. In addition, a polarization diversity scheme is used in the four-wave mixing (FWM) based TD-OFT, and less than 0.5 dB polarization sensitivity is demonstrated in the OTDM receiver.

Highly sensitive ultrafast pulse characterization using hydrogenated amorphous silicon waveguides

We experimentally demonstrate frequency resolved optical gating (FROG) via four-wave mixing (FWM) in ultrahigh nonlinearity hydrogenated amorphous silicon waveguides. We demonstrate FROG characterization using a FWM architecture that mimics second harmonic generation (SHG) FROG for pulsewidths as low as 360 fs. Additionally, we demonstrate for the first time a FWM architecture analogous to third harmonic generation (THG) FROG and validate its ability to overcome the direction of time ambiguity of the SHG-like architecture. Both architectures allow for sensitivities suitable for future telecommunications signals.

Dynamic characterization and amplification of sub-picosecond pulses in fiber optical parametric chirped pulse amplifiers

We show a first-time demonstration of amplification of 400 fs pulses in a fiber optical parametric amplifier. The 400 fs signal is stretched in time, amplified by 26 dB and compressed back to 500 fs. A significant broadening of the pulses is experimentally shown due to dispersion and limited gain bandwidth both in saturated and unsaturated gain regimes.

640 Gbaud (1.28 Tbit/s/ch) optical Nyquist pulse transmission over 525 km with substantial PMD tolerance

We report a substantial increase in PMD tolerance in a single-channel ultrahigh-speed transmission using optical Nyquist pulses. We demonstrate both analytically and experimentally a large reduction in depolarization-induced crosstalk with optical Nyquist pulses, which is one of the major obstacles facing polarization-multiplexed ultrashort pulse transmission. By taking advantage of the high PMD tolerance, a low-penalty 1.28 Tbit/s/ch optical Nyquist TDM transmission at 640 Gbaud was achieved over 525 km.

Baud-rate flexible clock recovery and channel identification in OTDM realized by pulse position modulation

We propose a novel scheme of OTDM utilizing pulse position modulation, where optical null headers (ONH) are inserted between the signal pulses periodically to allow channel identification. The ONH also achieves in-band clock distribution through the generation of high contrast pilot tone on the signal power spectra, enabling baud-rate flexible clock recovery. Using the novel scheme, clock recovery with a timing jitter of less than 200 fs is achieved at different baud rates up to 344 Gbaud. We demonstrate stable clock recovery with channel identification in 344-Gb/s OTDM transmissions over dispersion managed 3-km SMF.

Full 160-Gb/s OTDM to 16x10-Gb/s WDM conversion with a single nonlinear interaction

We experimentally demonstrate full simultaneous error-free demultiplexing of a 160-Gb/s OTDM data stream to 16x10-Gb/s WDM channels in a single nonlinear optical device. A temporal Fourier processor based upon a four-wave mixing (FWM) time lens is used to perform the demultiplexing operation. The FWM pump pulses are chirped such that they temporally overlap to allow for continuous operation; a necessary feature for full demultiplexing. We identify the fundamental challenges of operating in this continuous regime and characterize their impact on the system performance. We determine the main performance impairments to be crosstalk from adjacent WDM channels and crosstalk arising from non-degenerate FWM amongst the OTDM signal and the temporally overlapping pump pulses.

Wavelength conversion and unicast of 10-Gb/s data spanning up to 700 nm using a silicon nanowaveguide

We report extremely large probe-idler separation wavelength conversion (545 nm) and unicast (700 nm) of 10-Gb/s data signals using a dispersion-engineered silicon nanowaveguide. Dispersion-engineered phase matching in the device provides a continuous four-wave-mixing efficiency 3-dB bandwidth exceeding 800 nm. We report the first data validation of wavelength conversion (data modulated probe) and unicast (data modulated pump) of 10-Gb/s data with probe-idler separations spanning 60 nm up to 700 nm accompanied with sensitivity gain in a single device. These demonstrations further validate the silicon platform as a highly broadband flexible platform for nonlinear all-optical data manipulation.

Flexible OTDM to WDM converter enabled by a programmable optical processor

We propose an OTDM to WDM converter which enables wavelength tunability, flexible OTDM tributary to WDM channel mapping and modulation format transparency. The converted signals are obtained by four-wave mixing (FWM) the input 160 Gb/s OTDM signal with a multi-wavelength sampling pulse train (SPT). The generation of the multi-wavelength SPT starts by multicasting an optical clock signal. The multicast pulses are then individually delayed and reshaped by a programmable optical processor (POP), resulting in flexible generation of the SPT. Error-free performance was achieved in different OTDM tributary to WDM channel mappings. In addition, intermediate rate conversion (2x80 Gb/s) was also achieved simply by reconfiguring the POP.

10 GHz pulse source for 640 Gbit/s OTDM based on phase modulator and self-phase modulation

We demonstrate a high-quality cavity-free 10 GHz 680 fs pulse source starting from a continuous wave (CW) laser. The pulse source is employed in a 640 Gbit/s on-off keying (OOK) OTDM data generation and demultiplexing experiment, where the error-free bit error rate (BER) performance confirms the high pulse quality. The pulse source is based on a linear pulse compression stage followed by two polarization-independent non-linear pulse compression stages. The linear pulse compression stage relies on a phase modulator, which is used to generate linear chirp and followed by a dispersive element to compensate the chirp. The non-linear pulse compression stages are based on self-phase modulation (SPM) in dispersion-flattened highly non-linear fibers (DF-HNLF). The pulse source is tunable over the C-band with negligible pedestal.

Synchronization, retiming and time-division multiplexing of an asynchronous 10 Gigabit NRZ Ethernet packet to terabit Ethernet

An asynchronous 10 Gb/s Ethernet packet with maximum packet size of 1518 bytes is synchronized and retimed to a master clock with 200 kHz frequency offset using a time lens. The NRZ packet is simultaneously converted into an RZ packet, then further pulse compressed to a FWHM of 400 fs and finally time-division multiplexed with a serial 1.28 Tb/s signal including a vacant time slot, thus forming a 1.29 Tb/s time-division multiplexed serial signal. Error-free performance of synchronizing, retiming, time-division multiplexing to a Terabit data stream and finally demultiplexing back to 10 Gb/s of the Ethernet packet is achieved.

Light bullets in waveguide arrays: spacetime-coupling, spectral symmetry breaking and superluminal decay [Invited]

We investigate the effects of the space-time coupling (STC) on the nonlinear formation and propagation of Light Bullets, spatiotemporal solitons in which dispersion and diffraction along all dimensions are balanced by nonlinearity, through periodic media with a weak transverse modulation of the refractive index, i.e. waveguide arrays. The STC arises from wavelength dependence of the strength of inter-waveguide coupling and can be tuned by variation of the array geometry. We show experimentally and numerically that the STC breaks the spectral symmetry of Light Bullets to a considerable degree and modifies their group velocity, leading to superluminal propagation when the Light Bullets decay.

All-optical wavelength conversion for 10 Gb/s DPSK signals in a silicon ring resonator

We demonstrate all-optical wavelength conversion at 10 Gb/s for differential phase-shift keyed (DPSK) data signals in the C-band, based on four-wave mixing (FWM) in a silicon ring resonator. Error-free operation with a system penalty of ~4.1 dB at 10⁻⁹ BER is achieved.

All-optical XOR logic gate for 40Gb/s DPSK signals via FWM in a silicon nanowire

We demonstrate an all-optical XOR logic function for 40Gb/s differential phase-shift keyed (DPSK) data signals in the C-band, based on four-wave mixing (FWM) in a silicon nanowire. Error-free operation with a system penalty of ~3.0dB and ~4.3dB at 10⁻⁹ BER is achieved.

Scalable ultrahigh-speed optical transmultiplexer using a time lens

We present a scalable approach to optical time division multiplexing using an all-optical transmultiplexer incorporating a time lens. With simply a single nonlinear device we numerically demonstrate direct conversion from time-division multiplexing (TDM) to wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) with an industry standard 100-GHz channel spacing. Data rates at 1.28 Tb/s are realized in simulation. Additionally, various pump shapes are investigated to minimize distortions and reverse operation of the device (WDM to TDM conversion) is shown.

High-resolution, background-free, time-to-space conversion by collinearly phase-matched sum-frequency generation

We report the first demonstration, to our knowledge, of time-to-space conversion of 1.55 μm femtosecond optical pulses using nondegenerate, collinearly phase-matched sum-frequency generation. A quasi-monochromatic and background-free output signal spanning a time window of 35 ps and with a pulse image width of 350 fs was achieved. The resulting serial-to-parallel resolution factor of 100 demonstrates the potential for all-optical complete frame demultiplexing of a 1 Tbit/s optical time-division multiplexing bit stream.

Bandwidth scalable, coherent transmitter based on the parallel synthesis of multiple spectral slices using optical arbitrary waveform generation

We demonstrate an optical transmitter based on dynamic optical arbitrary waveform generation (OAWG) which is capable of creating high-bandwidth (THz) data waveforms in any modulation format using the parallel synthesis of multiple coherent spectral slices. As an initial demonstration, the transmitter uses only 5.5 GHz of electrical bandwidth and two 10-GHz-wide spectral slices to create 100-ns duration, 20-GHz optical waveforms in various modulation formats including differential phase-shift keying (DPSK), quaternary phase-shift keying (QPSK), and eight phase-shift keying (8PSK) with only changes in software. The experimentally generated waveforms showed clear eye openings and separated constellation points when measured using a real-time digital coherent receiver. Bit-error-rate (BER) performance analysis resulted in a BER < 9.8 × 10(-6) for DPSK and QPSK waveforms. Additionally, we experimentally demonstrate three-slice, 4-ns long waveforms that highlight the bandwidth scalable nature of the optical transmitter. The various generated waveforms show that the key transmitter properties (i.e., packet length, modulation format, data rate, and modulation filter shape) are software definable, and that the optical transmitter is capable of acting as a flexible bandwidth transmitter.

Generation of a 640 Gbit/s NRZ OTDM signal using a silicon microring resonator

A 640 Gbit/s NRZ OTDM signal has been successfully generated for the first time by format conversion of a 640 Gbit/s OTDM signal from RZ to NRZ. First, a coherent 640 Gbit/s OTDM RZ signal is generated by wavelength conversion of the original incoherent OTDM signal utilizing Kerr switching in a highly nonlinear fiber. Second, RZ-to-NRZ format conversion is achieved in a specially designed silicon microring resonator with FSR of 1280 GHz, Q value of 638, high extinction ratio and low coupling loss to optical fiber. A 640 Gbit/s NRZ OTDM signal with very clear eye-diagram and narrower bandwidth than both the original incoherent 640 Gbit/s and the wavelength converted coherent 640 Gbit/s RZ OTDM signals has been obtained. Bit error ratio measurements show error free (<10(-9)) performance at a received power of -30 dBm for all the OTDM channels of the 640 Gbit/s NRZ signal, with very low power penalty (<0.5 dB) and improved dispersion tolerance compared to the wavelength converted RZ case.

Flattened dispersion in silicon slot waveguides

We propose a silicon strip/slot hybrid waveguide that produces flattened dispersion of 0 ± 16 ps/(nm∙km), over a 553-nm wavelength range, which is 20 times flatter than previous results. Different from previously reported slot waveguides, the strip/slot hybrid waveguide employs the mode transition from a strip mode to a slot mode to introduce unique waveguide dispersion. The flat dispersion profile is featured by three zero-dispersion wavelengths, which is obtained for the first time in on-chip silicon waveguides, to the best of our knowledge. The waveguide exhibits flattened dispersion from 1562-nm to 2115-nm wavelength, which is potentially useful for both telecom and mid-infrared applications.

Orthogonal tributary channel exchange of 160-Gbit/s pol-muxed DPSK signal

We report the orthogonal tributary channel exchange of a polarization-multiplexed (pol-muxed) differential phase-shift keying (DPSK) optical time-division multiplexed (OTDM) signal by exploiting the Kerr effect-induced nonlinear birefringence in a highly nonlinear fiber (HNLF). We first implement Kerr effect-based 40-to-10, 80-to-10, and 160-to-10 Gbit/s demultiplexing of DPSK OTDM signals with power penalties of less than 0.5, 1.5, and 2.6 dB, respectively, at a bit-error rate (BER) of 10(-9). We further demonstrate 10-Gbit/s tributary channel exchange between two orthogonal polarizations of a 160-Gbit/s pol-muxed DPSK OTDM signal with a power penalty of less than 4 dB at a BER of 10(-9). Moreover, Jones matrix analyses are applied to the orthogonal polarization exchange, indicating the exchange condition of orthogonal polarization exchange with the characteristic of transparency to the modulation format. The exchange performance is analyzed in terms of the extinction ratio (ER) of the newly converted signal to the original residual signal. The dynamic range of the product of nonlinear coefficient, pump power, and effective fiber length, the dynamic range of pump power, the impact and tolerance of pump polarization offset are discussed to characterize and optimize the performance of orthogonal polarization exchange.

Photonic chip based transmitter optimization and receiver demultiplexing of a 1.28 Tbit/s OTDM signal

We demonstrate chip-based Tbaud optical signal processing for all-optical performance monitoring, switching and demultiplexing based on the instantaneous Kerr nonlinearity in a dispersion-engineered As(2)S(3) planar waveguide. At the Tbaud transmitter, we use a THz bandwidth radio-frequency spectrum analyzer to perform all-optical performance monitoring and to optimize the optical time division multiplexing stages as well as mitigate impairments, for example, dispersion. At the Tbaud receiver, we demonstrate error-free demultiplexing of a 1.28 Tbit/s single wavelength, return-to-zero signal to 10 Gbit/s via four-wave mixing with negligible system penalty (< 0.5 dB). Excellent performance, including high four-wave mixing conversion efficiency and no indication of an error-floor, was achieved. Our results establish the feasibility of Tbaud signal processing using compact nonlinear planar waveguides for Tbit/s Ethernet applications.

640 Gbit/s and 1.28 Tbit/s polarisation insensitive all optical wavelength conversion

We report the first demonstration of polarisation insensitive all-optical wavelength conversion (AOWC) for single wavelength channel 640 Gbit/s return-to-zero differential-phase-shift-keying (RZ-DPSK) signal and 1.28 Tbit/s polarisation multiplexed (Pol-Mux) RZ-DPSK signals using a 100-m polarisation-maintaining highly nonlinear fiber (PM-HNLF) in a polarisation diversity loop configuration. The AOWC is based on four-wave mixing in PM-HNLF. Error free performance is achieved for the wavelength converted signals. Less than 0.5 dB polarisation sensitivity is obtained.

Simple all-optical FFT scheme enabling Tbit/s real-time signal processing

A practical scheme to perform the fast Fourier transform in the optical domain is introduced. Optical real-time FFT signal processing is performed at speeds far beyond the limits of electronic digital processing, and with negligible energy consumption. To illustrate the power of the method we demonstrate an optical 400 Gbit/s OFDM receiver. It performs an optical real-time FFT on the consolidated OFDM data stream, thereby demultiplexing the signal into lower bit rate subcarrier tributaries, which can then be processed electronically.