25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran.

, AP/ECE 1
Fundamental Receiver Operation
 The first receiver element is a pin or an avalanche photodiode, which
produces an electric current proportional to the received power level.
 Since this electric current typically is very weak, a front-end amplifier
boosts it to a level that can be used by the following electronics.
 After being amplified, the signal passes through a low-pass filter to
reduce the noise that is outside of the signal bandwidth.
 The also filter can reshape (equalize) the pulses that have become
distorted as they traveled through the fiber.
 Together with a clock (timing) recovery circuit, a decision circuit
decides whether a 1 or 0 pulse was received,

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 2

 Error Sources

η τ η
N = ∫
hν 0
P (t ) dt =
hν
E
N − is the average number of electron
−N
e
Pr (n) = N n - hole pairs in photodetector
n!
η − is the detector quantum efficiency
E is energy received in a time interval and hν is photon energy,
where Pr (n) is the probability that n electrons are emitted in an
interval τ .
25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 3
 InterSymbol Interference (ISI)

Pulse spreading in an optical signal, after traversing along optical fiber, leads
to ISI. Some fraction of energy remaining in appropriate time slot is
designated by , so the rest is the fraction of energy that has spread into
adjacent time slots. γ

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 4

 Receiver Configuration

The binary digital pulse train incident on the photodetector can be written
in the following form:
+∞
P (t ) = ∑b h
n = −∞
n p (t − nTb )

where Tb is bit period, bn is an amplitude parameter of the nth message digit

and h p (t )is the received pulse shape which is positive for all t.

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 5

  We assume the digital pulses with amplitude V represents bit 1 and 0
represents bit 0. Thus bn can take two values corresponding to each
binary data. By normalizing the input pulse h p (t ) to the photodiode to
have unit area +∞

∫h
−∞
p (t )dt = 1

bn represents the energy in the nth pulse.

the mean output current from the photodiode at time t resulting from
pulse train given by (neglecting the DC components arising from dark
current noise):

ηq +∞
i (t ) = MP(t ) = ℜ o M ∑ bn h p (t − nTb )
hν n = −∞

ℜ o − Re sponsivity
25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 6
Bit Error Rate (BER)
BER = Probability of Error =
Number of error over a certain time interval t
=
total number of pulses transmitted during t
Ne Ne
= B = 1 / Tb
Nt Bt
 Probability of Error= probability that the output voltage
is less than the threshold when a 1 is sent + probability that
the output voltage is more than the threshold when a 0 has
been sent.
 Typical error rates for optical fiber telecom systems range
from 10–9 to 10–12 (compared to 10-6 for wireless systems)
 The error rate depends on the signal-to-noise ratio at the
receiver (the ratio of signal power to noise power).

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 7

 vth

Probability distributions for received logical 0 and 1 signal pulses.

the different widths of the two distributions are caused by various signal
distortion effects.
v
P1 (v) = ∫ p( y | 1)dy
−∞
probablity that the equalizer output voltage is less than v, if 1 transmitted

∞
P0 (v) = ∫ p ( y | 0)dy probablity that the equalizer output voltage exceeds v, if 0 transmitted
v

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 8

 Pe = q1 P1 (vth ) + q 0 P0 (vth )
vth ∞ [7-7]

= q1 ∫ p( y | 1)dy + q ∫ p( y | 1)dy
−∞
0
vth

 Where q1 and q 0 are the probabilities that the transmitter sends 0

and 1 respectively. q 0 = 1 − q1
 For an unbiased transmitter q 0 = q1 = 0.5

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 9

Gaussian Distribution

 (v − bon ) 2 
vth vth
1
P1 (vth ) = ∫ p( y | 1)dy =
−∞ 2π σ on
* ∫ exp −
−∞  2σ on 
2 dv
∞ ∞
1  (v − boff ) 2 
P0 (vth ) = ∫ p( y | 0)dy =
vth 2π σ off
* ∫ exp −
vth  2σ off 
2 dv

mean

mean

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 10

  If we assume that the probabilities of 0 and 1 pulses are equally likely,
then using above equation, BER becomes:

∞
1 1 Q 
BER = Pe (Q ) = ∫ exp(− x )dx = 1 − erf (
2
)
π Q/ 2 2 2 
1 exp(-Q 2 /2)
≈
2π Q

The − approximation
vth − boff bon − vth
Q= =
σ off σ on
x
2
erf ( x ) = ∫ − 2
exp( y )dy
π 0

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 11

 Approximation of error function

Variation of BER vs Q, .

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 12

Special Case
In special case when:

σ off = σ on = σ & boff = 0, bon = V

From eq [7-29], we have: vth = V / 2

Eq [7-8] becomes:

1 V 
Pe (σ ) = 1 − erf ( )
2 2 2σ 
V [7-11]
is peak signal - to - rms - noise ratio.
σ

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 13

Quantum Limit
 Minimum received power required for a specific BER assuming that the
photodetector has a 100% quantum efficiency and zero dark current.
For such ideal photo-receiver,

Pe = P1 (0) = exp(− N )

 Where N is the average number of electron-hole pairs, when the

incident optical pulse energy is E and given by eq [7-1] with 100%
quantum efficiency (η = 1) .
 Note that, in practice the sensitivity of receivers is around 20 dB higher
than quantum limit because of various nonlinear distortions and noise
effects in the transmission link.

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 14

Fiber attenuation measurements

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 15

Fiber attenuation measurements

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 16

Fiber attenuation Spot measurements

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 17

Fiber absorption loss measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 18

Fiber absorption loss measurement
 The time constant tc may be obtained from the slope of the straight
line plotted in Figure as:

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 19

Fiber absorption loss measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 20

Fiber scattering loss measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 21

Fiber scattering loss measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 22

Fiber dispersion measurement
 Time domain measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 23

Fiber dispersion measurement
 Frequency domain measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 24

Swept frequency measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 25

Fiber Refractive index profile measurement
 Interferometric methods

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 26

Fiber Refractive index profile measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 27

Fiber Refractive index profile measurement
 Induced-grating autocorrelation function technique

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 28

Fiber Refractive index profile measurement
 Photorefractive index effect

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 29

Fiber Refractive index profile measurement
 Near-field scanning method

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 30

Fiber Refractive index profile measurement
 Refracted near-field method

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 31

Fiber cutoff wavelength measurement
 (a) single turn; (b) split mandrell

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 32

Fiber Numerical aperture measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 33

Fiber Numerical aperture measurement
 Apparatus for trigonometric fiber numerical aperture measurement

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 34

Fiber diameter measurement
 Outer diameter

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 35

Fiber Mode-field diameter for single-mode fiber

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 36

Fiber Mode-field diameter for single-mode fiber
 Experimental arrangement for far-field intensity distribution
measurements (far-field scanning) to obtain mode-field diameter

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 37

Fiber Mode-field diameter for single-mode fiber
 Experimental setup for the measurement of mode-field diameter by
transverse offset technique

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 38

Fiber Mode-field diameter for single-mode fiber

25-Sep-19 Prepared by: Mr.P.Gunasekaran., AP/ECE 39