Investigation of data-format-transparent multiwavelength all-optical clock recovery using a single FP-SOA

Multiwavelength clock recovery (CR) is desired to perform all-optical parallel processing, which has potential application in optical communication systems that use WDM technology. Fabry-Pérot semiconductor optical amplifier (FP-SOA) can perform the similar filter function as passive FP filter, and can simultaneously provide gain for oscillation pulses in the cavity; it is essentially an active filter. We experimentally demonstrated simultaneous multiwavelength all-optical CR from input 36.47-Gb/s pseudo-return-zero (PRZ) data and non-return-zero (NRZ) data using a single multi-quantum-well (MQW) FP-SOA with facets reflectivity of 30%. The presented multiwavelength CR scheme is also suitable for PSK signals. Dual-channel CR from input two channels 36.47-Gb/s 2²³−1 NRZ-DPSK data located at different wavelength is experimentally demonstrated. This scheme is transparent for data formats, which is very important for next generation optical networks.