半导体光放大器引起的串扰及其抑制技术

由于半导体光放大器(SOA)的增益饱和效应,在波分复用系统中.每个信道的增益受到复用的其它信道的影响.SOA引起的各信道之间的串扰严重限制了其应用.理论研究了SOA增益饱和效应引起的信道间串扰.数值模拟了多路信道复用时系统的误码率随复用信道数和光功率的变化情况,发现随着复用信道数的增加SOA增益饱和引起的信道间串扰越来越严重.对SOA中串扰的抑制方法进行了理论和实验研究.数值模拟发现连续光注入可以抑制输出功率的波动,从而减小误码率,当复用10个信道时,连续光注入可以使功率代价减小2 dB;实验验证了两信道的40 Gb/s系统中,注入连续光可以减少SOA引起的信道间串扰.     

Power budget improvement for long-haul WDM transmission with optimum placement of SOAs

Sufficient power margin is investigated for ten-channels WDM transmission over 68,908 km by using cascaded in-line semiconductor optical amplifier for the differential phase-shift keying (DPSK) modulation format for the first time. For this, we used the structural optimization and placement scheme of semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs) for long-haul WDM transmission. The SOA model for in-line amplifier has low crosstalk, ASE noise power and low noise figure with sufficient gain. The impact of noise figure, amplification factor, ASE noise power, optical gain and crosstalk with signal input power for the SOA model has been illustrated, which shows that 400 mA is the optimum bias current.

We observed that the optimized optical filter bandwidth for the 100 GHz channel spacing is 0.4 nm. We observe that as we decrease the channel spacing, the quality of signal is degraded. We show that the optimum span scheme-1 is used up to a transmission distance of 68,908 km with good quality for power margin more than 24 dB. This placement scheme of SOAs shows good power budget for long transmission distance. We show the optical spectrum and clear eye diagram at the transmission distance of 68,908 km for optimum span schemes. Finally, we investigate the maximum transmission distance with decrease in channel spacing, i.e., 20 and 50 GHz.     

利用色散管理抑制半导体光放大器引起的信道间串扰

理论研究了半导体光放大器增益饱和效应引起的信道间串扰,数值模拟了多路信道复用时系统的误码率随复用信道数和光功率的变化情况,发现随着复用信道数的增加,半导体光放大器增益饱和引起的信道间串扰越来越严重.对利用色散管理技术抑制半导体光放大器引起的信道间串扰进行了实验研究,实验验证了信号色散补偿之前用半导体光放大器放大可以抑制半导体光放大器引起的信道间串扰.结果表明,采用先放大后色散补偿这种新的色散补偿方案,可以有效抑制半导体光放大器引起的信道间串扰.     

Investigation of gain recovery for InAs/GaAs quantum dot semiconductor optical amplifiers by rate equation simulation

The gain recoveries in quantum dot semiconductor optical amplifiers (QD SOAs) are numerically studied by rate equation simulation. Similar to the optical pump-probe experiment, the injection of double 150 fs optical pulses is used to simulate the gain recovery of a weak continuous signal under different injection levels, inhomogeneous broadenings, detuning wavelengths, and pulse signal energies for the QD SOAs. The obtained gain recoveries are then fitted by a response function with multiple exponential terms to determine the response times. The gain recovery can be described by three exponential terms with the time constants, which can be explained as carrier relaxation from the excited state to the ground state, carrier captured by the excited state from the wetting layer, and the supply of the wetting layer carriers. The fitted lifetimes decrease with the increase of the injection currents under gain unsaturation, slightly decrease with the decrease of inhomogeneous broadening of QDs, and increase with the increase of detuning wavelength between continuous signal and pulse signal and the increase of the pulse energy.     

Enhancement in the gain recovery of a semiconductor optical amplifier by device temperature control

We present a numerical investigation on the temperature dependence of gain recovery, of a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA). It is shown that the decrease in temperature significantly speed-up the gain recovery of the SOA. Under typical operating conditions, a 20 K reduction in temperature of the SOA results in a decrease of 150 ps in the gain recovery time. A comparative estimation of device temperature and assisted-light power requirements for enhancing the gain recovery has also been carried out. It is found that, a decrease of 8 K in the temperature of the SOA, is as effective in enhancing the gain recovery as injection of 25 dBm assisted-light power in the counter-propagating mode. Our study shows that under moderate current biasing conditions, temperature reduction is a better and convenient option to speed-up the gain recovery of an SOA, than the use of external assisted-light injection, which requires an additional laser source and wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) components for coupling and de-coupling, leading to insertion losses in the communication channel.     

Performance analysis and improvement of semiconductor optical amplifier direct modulation with assistance of microring resonator notch filter

We demonstrate through numerical simulations that a passive single-bus microring resonator (MRR) employed as notch filter enables to directly modulate an ordinary semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) at 10 Gb/s. This data rate constitutes a fourfold increase in the speed that it is possible to modulate the SOA due to its finite differential carrier lifetime. The theoretical analysis unveils how the MRR radius and detuning must be selected so that the MRR-based filtering scheme efficiently overcomes the pattern-dependent impairments incurred by the SOA narrow electrical bandwidth. Moreover, the small-signal analysis conducted to correlate the perturbations in power of the modulated optical signal inserted in the MRR with those at the MRR output confirms the enhancement in the electrical bandwidth of the SOA–MRR combination. Provided that the MRR response is tailored as suggested, which is technologically feasible, the MRR action permits the encoded signal to exhibit at extended data rate a pulse and eye diagram profile of acceptable quality, tolerable amplitude difference indices, an error probability below the forward error correction limit, and a sufficient system net gain for medium-haul transmission in standard single-mode fiber with dispersion compensation. These performance improvements can be beneficial for the direct modulation of standard SOAs. Together with SOAs inherent amplification capability, they can open new perspectives in using these active elements as external modulators in various target applications.     

半导体光放大器非线性失真特性实验研究

对半导体光放大器（SOA）用于1 310 nm残留边带幅度调制（AM-VSB）视频光信号放大时的非线性失真特性进行了实验研究.分析了非线性失真机理.给出了当输入光信号波长位于SOA增益谱下降沿且输入光信号功率较大时,SOA所引入的非线性失真主要由其增益随输入光信号功率变化而波动所造成的结论和对应表达式.提出了减小非线性失真的方法.设计了适合于AM-VSB视频光信号放大的SOA并用于有线电视（CATV）系统实验.研究结果表明,在300 mA的工作电流下,SOA在载频647.25 MHz处引入的组合二阶互调失真（CSO）在－42 dB～－38 dB之间,并随输入光信号功率的增加而变大.     

重复脉冲注入下半导体光放大器皮秒增益和折射率非线性的数值模拟

对重复周期小于载流子寿命的重复脉冲注入的情况，从速率方程出发，用分段模型对半导体光放大器的皮秒增益和折射率非线性进行了数值模拟，给出了重复脉冲注入下输出光脉冲时域波形的畸变、注入光脉冲引起的增益和相位变化，输出光脉冲上的频率啁啾随注入脉冲数增加的变化，以及归零光信号码流引起的增益和相位变化。     

Minimization of Cross-Gain Saturation in Wavelength Division Multiplexing by Optimizing Differential Gain in Semiconductor Optical Amplifiers

We successfully simulated the 10 × 40 Gbit/s soliton RZ-DPSK WDM signals over 1050 km with spectral efficiency approaching 0.4 bit/s/Hz using semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs) as in-line amplifier. The cross-gain saturation of SOA can be minimized by settling crosstalk at a lower level by decreasing the differential gain. This decrease in differential gain is in such a way that we get nil power penalty. The maximum transmission distance of 1050 km is possible with differential gain 210 atto cm² of SOA.

The impact of amplification factor, ASE noise power, crosstalk, quality factor and bit error rate for different differential gain has been investigated. It has been shown that with the increase in differential gain of SOA, the transmission distance goes on decreasing. At high value of differential gain 2.5 × 10^-16 cm² for the transmission distance 1050 km, all channels produce inter channel crosstalk with bit error rate greater than 10^-6. But for lower differential gain 190 atto cm², the quality of all channel increases at the cost of large power penalty.

With slight increase in differential gain 200 atto cm², the maximum transmission distance observed is 4550 km with quality of received signal more than 15 dB and having nil power penalty. We observed clear eye diagrams and optical power spectra for received signal with transmission distance 1050 km and 4550 km using soliton RZ-DPSK system. The bit error rate for all channels increase more than 10^-10 with the increase in launched input power that is due to power saturation.     

An approach to enhance the receiver sensitivity with SOA for optical communication systems

In this paper, we investigate an SOA (semiconductor optical amplifier) preamplifier structure by optimizing the carrier lifetime in order to reduce the amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) noise and crosstalk, with adequate gain increase. This proposed SOA optical preamplifier has no need of optical alignment and antireflection coating. This structure of SOA eliminates the need of optical filter, and exhibits large tolerance to the input light wavelength. The receiver sensitivity is investigated for single and multi channel transmission links. The received power of − 50.34 dBm is observed at bit error rate (BER) 10^− 12 for 10 Gb/s with PIN receiver. Further, the impact of gain, amplified spontaneous emission power and gain variation for different carrier lifetime with input power for OOK system is illustrated. The proposed SOA has constant gain of 30.06 dB up to gain saturation for carrier lifetime 0.18 ns. It is predicted that low value of carrier lifetime suffers less from ASE noise.     

半导体光放大器增益波动的研究

详细研究了行波半导体光放大器的增益波动特性，理论模型的建立舍弃了通常采用的载流子在光放大器中沿腔长方向均匀分布的假设。分析表明，光放大器增益波动的大小与器件端面反射率、自发发射因子以及入射光功率等因素有关。理论计算与实验结果得到了较好的吻合     

包含两个半导体光放大器的锁模光纤环形激光器数值研究

采用自再现理论,对一种包含两个半导体光放大器的锁模光纤环形激光器进行了数值研究.研究结果表明：为了提高谐波锁模输出脉冲的质量,调制半导体光放大器应当保持高直流偏置,对自发辐射信号进行调制并提供锁模脉冲克服腔损耗所需的增益,而此时的增益半导体光放大器则被低直流偏置充当增益补偿器维持较窄的净增益窗口;与之相反,为了获得振幅均衡的有理数谐波锁模输出脉冲,调制半导体光放大器则应当偏置在较低的电流上,而增益半导体光放大器应当保持较高的偏置电流以提供足够的常量增益克服腔损耗.此外,还必须提高注入光信号的峰值功率.     

半导体光放大器增益及发光特性的理论研究

半导体光放大器(SOA)的非线性特性在光开关、波长变换、光逻辑运算中有重要的应用.研究了注入电流、入射光波长及SOA有源区长度对SOA增益和发光功率的影响.数值模拟结果表明:注入电流的增加,会引起载流子浓度的增加,且使SOA增益趋于饱和的速率加快;不同的SOA模型存在一个最佳输入光波长,在此波长附近有较好的增益特性;加长半导体光放大器有源区长度可获得更大增益,同时提高了器件的响应速率.     

Simulation of DWDM signals using optimum span scheme with cascaded optimized semiconductor optical amplifiers

We numerically simulated the ten channels at 10 Gb/s dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) transmission faithfully over 17,227 km using 70 km span of single mode fiber (SMF) and dispersion compensating fiber (DCF) using optimum span scheme at channel spacing 20 GHz. For this purpose, inline optimized semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs) and DPSK format are used. We optimized the SOA parameters for inline amplifier with minimum crosstalk and amplified spontaneous emission noise with sufficient gain at bias current 400 mA. For this bias current, constant gain 36.5 dB is obtained up to saturation power 21.35 mW. We have also optimized the optical phase modulator bandwidth for 400 mA current which is around 5.5 GHz with crosstalk −14.2 dB between two channels at spacing 20 GHz.We show the 10×10 Gb/s transmission over 70 km distance with inline amplifier has good signal power received as compared to without amplifier, even at equal quality factor. We further investigated the optimum span scheme for 5670 km transmission distance for 10×10 Gb/s with channel spacing 20 at 5.5 GHz optical phase modulator bandwidth. As we increase the transmission distance up to 17,227 km, there is increase in power penalty with reasonable quality.The impact of optical power received and Q factor at 5670 and 17,227 km transmission distance for different span schemes for all channels has been illustrated. For launched optical power less than saturation, all channels are obtained at bit error rate floor of 10⁻¹⁰.     

提高SOA响应速度的几种方法

在全光网和全光信号处理中，半导体光放大器（SOA）因其优良的非线性特性和快速响应特性而得到了广泛应用。增益恢复时间是表征SOA响应速度的关键参数。研究了增益恢复时间与SOA工作参数的关系，理论上得到动态增益特性、增益恢复时间与各参数之间的关系，并参考实际参数，进行了数值模拟。模拟结果表明，增加腔长、减小横截面积、增大注入电流、增大CW辅助光功率、增大探测光功率，均可提高SOA的响应速度。     

多电极半导体光放大器对增益特性的改善

提出了采用多电极实现电流非均匀注入来改变半导体光放大器(SOA)内部的载流子分布,从而改变其增益饱和特性的一种新的方案.用SOA分段模型的计算结果表明,与单电极均匀注入电流的SOA 相比,在同样的总注入电流下,对一个两电极SOA采用前面小后面大的非均匀电流注入,可以提高饱和输出功率和饱和输入功率.而采用前面大后面小的电流注入方式,则将使SOA更容易发生饱和,不仅饱和输出功率与饱和输入功率减小,而且增益谱在饱和后的压缩程度加大,增益谱压缩的对称性提高.对多电极SOA,可以方便灵活地调节各节之间的长度比和注入电流比来满足不同的应用要求.     

82-channel multi-wavelength comb generation in a SOA fiber ring laser

We demonstrate a multi-wavelength semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) fiber ring laser with a dual-pass Mach-Zehnder interferometer (MZI) filter. Two SOAs with different gain spectra provide sufficient gain and a wider gain spectrum to facilitate multi-wavelength lasing. The dual-pass MZI, configured by adding an optical isolator to the two outputs of the conventional MZI, serves as comb filter for multi-wavelength operation, and its extinction ratio can be enhanced to twofold as that of the conventional MZI in the same parameters. To investigate the influences of a dual-pass MZI filter and a conventional MZI filter on multi-wavelength operation, two different cavity configurations are presented and compared, including a single-SOA ring cavity and a double-SOA ring cavity. Stable simultaneous operation at 82 wavelengths, with a wavelength spacing of 40 GHz and a power deviation of 5 dB, and with a minimum optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) of 28 dB, is observed from the double-SOA ring cavity using a dual-pass MZI filter.     

Polarization dependence of electroluminescence from closely-stacked and columnar quantum dots

Quantum dots (QDs) have a potential for application in semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs), due to their high saturation power related to the low differential gain, fast gain recovery and wide gain spectrum compared to quantum wells. Besides all advantages, QDs realized by Stranski-Krastanov growth mode have a flat shape which leads to a gain anisotropy and a related transverse magnetic (TM) and -electric (TE) polarization dependence as compared to bulk material. This has so far prevented their applications in SOAs. It has been suggested that control of optical polarization anisotropy of the QD can be obtained through QD shape engineering, in closely stacked or columnar QDs (CQDs). To this aim, we have fabricated and tested SOA structures based on closely-stacked and columnar QDs. Closely-stacked InAs QDs with 4, 6 and 10 nm GaAs spacer showed a minor improvement in the ratio of TM and TE integrated electroluminescence (EL) over standard QDs along with a strong reduction in efficiency. In contrast, a large improvement was obtained in CQDs, depending on the number of stacked submonolayers which can be attributed to the more symmetric shape of columnar QDs. A relatively small spectral separation (ΔE ~ 21 meV) between TE- and TM-EL peaks has been observed showing that heavy- and light hole-like states, respectively are energetically close in these QDs. These results indicate that columnar QDs have a significant potential for polarization-independent QD SOA.     

基于SOA和级联取样光纤光栅的多波长激光器

研究了基于半导体光放大器(SOA)和双段级联取样光纤光栅构成的新型结构多波长激光器.设 计了取样光纤光栅，计算了其反射谱，模拟了多波长激光器的输出光谱.基于自行制作的SOA 和取样光纤光栅，进行了多波长激光器的实验研究，得到了间隔为0.8nm、输出功率不平坦 度小于1.0dB的11个波长输出.理论和实验两个方面都可以验证：与基于普通取样光栅的多波 长方案相比，基于双段级联取样光栅的方案能改善输出谱平坦度，并可提高可激射波长数. 关键词： 半导体光放大器 取样光纤光栅 多波长激光器     

Filter-free ultrawideband generation based on semiconductor optical amplifier nonlinearities

A filter-free scheme for ultrawideband (UWB) generation with single semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) is proposed and demonstrated. A pair of polarity-reversed optical pulses is generated due to cross gain modulation (XGM) in the pump-probe scheme, whereas the amplified pump pulse becomes sharp at its leading edge such that the power peak is shifted forward. Hence, the combination of the pump and probe signals at the SOA output is quasi-monocycle shape. Our scheme is an improved scheme to avoid exploiting optical filters and time-delay devices. The generated UWB radio frequency spectrum shows good stability when the input probe power varies from −10 dBm to 6 dBm, the probe wavelength varies in the whole C-band, and the bias current varies from 100 mA to 240 mA. Although the generated quasi-monocycle deviates from a standard Gauss monocycle to some extent, the frequency spectrum conforms to the UWB regulation. Two SOAs with different XGM dynamics are compared in generating UWB signals.