Numerical Analysis of the Crosstalk on an Integrated Acousto-Optic Tunable Filter (AOTF) for Network Applications

In this article, we did a study of the crosstalk level (Xtalk) and extinction ratio (Xratio) of an acousto-optic tunable filter (AOTF) operating with ultra-short light pulses (2 ps). It is clear that the transmission bandwidth decreases as the length of the device increases. The compression factor was studied for the switched pulse in an AOTF without loss considering five nonlinearity profiles. One can observe that there is always an optimum value for β (final value of the nonlinearity) that one can obtain a switched pulse with the same time duration of the input pulse. The study of the crosstalk level, of this device, considering the optimum values of β obtained from the compression studies, as a function of the pump power (P₀) was done. For the soliton profile at 1 W of pump power one can notice that the Gaussian profile presents the lower Xtalk value (-13 dB), and the constant profile presents the worst value (-9.8 dB). However, if one is looking for a specific Xtalk value, one can conclude that with the constant profile one can obtain this value with a lower power. For the quasi-soliton profile of the same device, with low pump power (1 W), one can notice again that the Gaussian profile presents the lower Xtalk value (-13 dB) and the constant profile presents the worst value (-9.87 dB). This fact can be explained because, with pump power at 1 W, soliton and quasi-soliton profiles lead equivalent input pulses and under the same conditions produce equal results. The Xtalk level, considering all the profiles as a function of the β value, was studied. For all the profiles one has a strong increase of the Xtalk level with the increase of the final β value of the nonlinearity profile. Comparing all the profiles one can conclude that the Gaussian profile presents the lower Xtalk value in the range of β values in use. At the same time the value of the Xtalk for this profile does not change much with the change in the β value, presenting values in interval (-13 dB; -11.7 dB).

The studies of the Xratio of the same device operating with the input pulses with the soliton and quasi-soliton profiles reveal that for all the nonlinearity profiles the Xratio increases with an increase in pump power. For the quasi-soliton profile one can notice that there is a minimum of the Xratio as a function of the pump power. The Xratio considering all the profiles as a function of the β value shows that for all the profiles one has a strong increase of the Xratio level with the increase of the final β value of the nonlinearity profile. Comparing all the profiles one can conclude that the Gaussian profile presents the lower Xratio value in the range of β values in use. One can conclude that the operation of the AOTF in a switching configuration is worse for high pump power as observed for Xtalk.

The study of the crosstalk level and the extinction ratio on the AOTF operating with ultra-short optical solitons provides possibilities for achieving high efficiency in ultra fast all-optical signal processing, especially for optical switches, filters, and optical transistors. The acoustic-optic tunable filter (AOTF) has attracted great attention in recent years, in part because it appears to be a suitable basis for multi-wavelength optical cross-connects. It is probably the only known tunable filter that is capable of selecting several wavelengths simultaneously. This capability can be used to construct a multi-wavelength router.