Chapter 8: Optical Fibers and Components

TOPICS
WDM optical networks Light transmitted through an optical fiber Types of optical fibers Impairments Components: Lasers, optical amplifiers, couplers,
OXCs
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WDM optical networks

1 Tx 1 Rx

W Tx Wavelength multiplexer Power amplifier optical fiber In-line amplification optical fiber Preamplifier W

Rx Wavelength demultiplexer

A point-to-point connection

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An example of an optical network

Mesh network

Ring 1

Ring 4

Ring 2

Ring 3

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How light is transmitted through an optical fiber

Wave Electric field Source

Waves and electrical fields

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An optical fiber
Cladding Core Cladding

Core and cladding

Cladding Core

Cladding Core

Refractive index

n2

Refractive index

n1

n1

n2

Radial distance

Radial distance

a) Step-index fiber
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b) graded-index fiber
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Refraction and reflection of a light ray

f
n2 Refracted ray

n1

Incident ray

r
Reflected ray

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Angle of launching a ray into the fiber

Cladding Cladding Core Core Cladding Cladding

Cladding Optical transmitter Core Cladding

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Multi-mode and single-mode fibers

Core/diameter of a multi-mode fiber:
50/125 m, 62.5/125 m, 100/140 m

Core/diameter of single-mode fiber

9 or 10 / 125 m

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Electric fields
A 2 Cladding Core

1 B Cladding

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Electric field amplitudes for various fiber modes

Cladding

Core

Cladding m=0 m=1 m=2

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Propagation of modes
Cladding

Cladding

a) step-index fiber
Cladding

Cladding

b) Graded-index fiber
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Single-mode fiber
Cladding

Cladding

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Impairments The transmission of light through an optical fiber is subjected to optical effects, known as impairments. There are:
linear impairments, and non-linear impairments.
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Linear impairments
These impairments are called linear because their effect is proportional to the length of the fiber. Attenuation:
Attenuation is the decrease of the optical power along the length of the fiber.

Dispersion
Dispersion is the distortion of the shape of a pulse.
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Attenuation
2.5 2.0 Attenuation, dB

1.5 1.0 0.5

800

1000

1200 1400 Wavelength, nm

1600

1800

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Dispersion Dispersion is due to a number of reasons, such as

modal dispersion, chromatic dispersion, polarization mode dispersion.

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Modal dispersion
Power Power Power

Time

Time

Time

In multi-mode fibers some modes travel a longer distance to get to the end of the fiber than others In view of this, the modes have different delays, which causes a spreading of the output pulse
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Chromatic dispersion
It is due to the fact that the refractive index of silica is frequency dependent. In view of this, different frequencies travel at different speeds, and as a result they experience different delays. These delays cause spreading in the duration of the output pulse.
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 Chromatic dispersion can be corrected using a dispersion compensating fiber. The length of this fiber is proportional to the dispersion of the transmission fiber. Approximately, a spool of 15 km of dispersion compensating fiber is placed for every 80 km of transmission fiber. Dispersion compensating fiber introduces attenuation of about 0.5 dB/km.
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Polarization mode dispersion (PMD)

It is due to the fact that the core of the fiber is not perfectly round. In an ideal circularly symmetric fiber the light gets polarized and it travels along two polarization planes which have the same speed. When the core of the fiber is not round, the light traveling along the two planes may travel at different speeds. This difference in speed will cause the pulse to break.
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Non-linear impairments
They are due to the dependency of the refractive index on the intensity of the applied electrical field. The most important non-linear effects in this category are: selfphase modulation and four-wave mixing. Another category of non-linear impairments includes the stimulated Raman scattering and stimulated Brillouin scattering.
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Types of fibers
Multi-mode fibers: They are used in LANs and more recently in 1 Gigabit Ethernet and 10 Gigabit Ethernet. Single-mode fiber is used for long-distance telephony, CATV, and packet-switched networks. Plastic optical fibers (POF)
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Single-mode fibers:
Standard single-mode fiber (SSMF): Most of the installed fiber falls in this category. It was designed to support early long-haul transmission systems, and it has zero dispersion at 1310 nm. Non-zero dispersion fiber (NZDF): This fiber has zero dispersion near 1450 nm.
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Negative dispersion fiber (NDF): This type of fiber has a negative dispersion in the region 1300 to 1600 nm. Low water peak fiber (LWPF): The peak in the attenuation curve at 1385 nm is known as the water peak. With this new type of fiber this peak is eliminated, which allows the use of this region.

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Plastic optical fibers (POF)

Single-mode and multi-mode fibers have a high cost and they require a skilled technician to install them. POFs on the other hand, are very low-cost and they can be easily installed by an untrained person. The core has a very large diameter, and it is about 96% of the diameter of the cladding. Plastic optic fibers find use in digital home appliance interfaces, home networks, and cars
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Components
Lasers Photo-detectors and optical receivers Optical amplifiers The 2x2 coupler Optical cross connects (OXC)

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Light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation (Laser)

A laser is a device that produces a very strong and concentrated beam. It consists of an energy source which is applied to a lasing material, a substance that emits light in all directions and it can be of gas, solid, or semiconducting material. The light produced by the lasing material is enhanced using a device such as the Fabry-Perot resonator cavity.
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Fabry-Perot resonator cavity.

It consists of two partially reflecting parallel flat mirrors, known as facets, which create an optical feedback that causes the cavity to oscillate. Light hits the right facet and part of it leaves the cavity through the right facet and part of it is reflected.
Left facet Right facet

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 Since there are many resonant wavelengths, the resulting output consists of many wavelengths spread over a few nm, with a gap between two adjacent wavelengths of 100 to 200 GHz. A single wavelength can be selected by using a filtering mechanism that selects the desired wavelength and provides loss to the other wavelengths.
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Tunable lasers
Tunable lasers are important to optical networks Also, it is more convenient to manufacture and stock tunable lasers, than make different lasers for specific wavelengths. Several different types of tunable lasers exist, varying from slow tunability to fast tunability.
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Modulation
Modulation is the addition of information on a light stream This can be realized using the on-off keying (OOK) scheme, whereby the light stream is turned on or off depending whether we want to modulate a 1 or a 0.

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WDM and dense WDM (DWDM)

WDM or dense WDM (DWDM) are terms used interchangeably. DWDM refers to the wavelength spacing proposed in the ITU-T G.692 standard in the 1550 nm window (which has the smallest amount of attenuation and it also lies in the band where the Erbium-doped fiber amplifier operates.) The ITU-T grid is not always followed, since there are many proprietary solutions.
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The ITU-T DWDM grid

Channel code 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 (nm) 1563.05 1562.23 1561.42 1560.61 1559.80 1558.98 1558.17 1557.36 1556.56 1555.75 1554.94 1554.13 Channel code 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 (nm) 1553.33 1552.53 1551.72 1590.12 1550.12 1549.32 1548.52 1547.72 1546.92 1546.12 1545.32 1544.53 Channel code 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 (nm) 1543.73 1542.94 1542.14 1541.35 1540.56 1539.77 1538.98 1538.19 1537.40 1536.61 1535.82 1535.04 Channel code 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 (nm) 1534.25 1533.47 1532.68 1531.90 1531.12 1530.33 1529.55 1528.77 1527.99

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Photo-detectors and optical receivers

The WDM optical signal is demultiplexed into the W different wavelengths, and each wavelength is directed to a receiver. Each receiver consists of a
photodetector, an amplifier, and signal-processing circuit.

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Optical amplifiers
The optical signal looses its power as it propagates through an optical fiber, and after some distance it becomes too weak to be detected. Optical amplification is used to restore the strength of the signal

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1 Tx

Rx

W Tx Wavelength multiplexer Power amplifier optical fiber In-line amplification optical fiber Preamplifier

W Rx Wavelength demultiplexer

Amplifiers: power amplifiers, in-line amplifiers, pre-amplifiers

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1R, 2R, 3R
Prior to optical amplifiers, the optical signal was regenerated by first converting it into an electrical signal, then apply
1R (re-amplification), or 2R (re-amplification and re-shaping) or 3R (re-amplification, re-shaping, and re-timing)

and then converting the regenerated signal back into the optical domain.
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The Erbium-doped fiber amplifier (EDFA)

Signal to be amplified 1550 nm Isolator Coupler Erbium-doped fiber

Isolator

Laser 850 nm

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Two-stage EDFA
Signal to be amplified 1550 nm Isolator Coupler Erbium-doped fiber Coupler

Isolator

Laser 850 nm

Laser 850 nm

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The 2x2 coupler

Fiber 1 Input 1 Output 1

Input 2 Fiber 2 Tapered region Coupling region Tapered region

Output 2

The 2x2 coupler is a basic device in optical networks, and it can be constructed in variety of different ways. A common construction is the fused-fiber coupler.
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3-dB coupler
A 2x2 coupler is called a 3-dB coupler when the optical power of an input light applied to, say input 1 of fiber 1, is evenly divided between output 1 and output 2.

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If we only launch a light to the one of the two inputs of a 3-dB coupler, say input 1, then the coupler acts as a splitter. If we launch a light to input 1 and a light to input 2 of a 3-dB coupler, then the two lights will be coupled together and the resulting light will be evenly divided between outputs 1 and 2. In the above case, if we ignore output 2, the 3-dB coupler acts as a combiner.
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A banyan network of 3-dB couplers

1,2..,8 1,2..,8

1,2..,8 1,2..,8

1,2..,8 1,2..,8

7 8

1,2..,8 1,2..,8

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Optical cross connects (OXCs)

Input fibers 1 CPU Output fibers 1

Fiber 1

...

Fiber N

A logical diagram of an OXC

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W 1

W Fiber 1 ... 1

W Switch fabric

W Fiber N

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OXC functionality
It switches optically all the incoming wavelengths of the input fibers to the outgoing wavelengths of the output fibers. For instance, it can switch the optical signal on incoming wavelength i of input fiber k to the outgoing wavelength i of output fiber m.
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Converters:
If it is equipped with converters, it can switch the optical signal of the incoming wavelength i of input fiber k to another outgoing wavelength j of the output fiber m. This happens when the wavelength i of the output fiber m is in use. Converters typically have a limited range within they can convert a wavelength.
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 Optical add/drop multiplexer (OADM):

An OXC can also be used as an OADM. That is, it can terminate the optical signal of a number of incoming wavelengths and insert new optical signals on the same wavelengths in an output port. The remaining incoming wavelengths are switched through as described above.

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Transparent and Opaque Switches

Transparent switch:
The incoming wavelengths are switched to the output fibers optically, without having to convert them to the electrical domain.

Opaque switch:
The input optical signals are converted to electrical signals, from where the packets are extracted. Packets are switched using a packet switch, and then they are transmitted out of the switch in the optical domain.
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Switch technologies
Several different technologies exist:
micro electronic mechanical systems (MEMS) semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOA) micro-bubbles holograms Also, 2x2 directional coupler , such as the electro-optic switch, the thermo-optic switch, and the Mach-Zehnder interferometer, can be used to construct large OXC switch fabrics
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2D MEMS switching fabric

Input ports

Up

Actuator Mirro r

Down

Output ports

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A 2D MEMS OADM
Drop wavelengths

Add wavelengths Terminate wavelengths

1,2..,W

1,2..,W

1,2..,W

Add wavelengths

Logical design

2D MEMS implementation

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3D MEMS switching fabric

Output wavelengths y axis MEMS array Inside ring Input wavelengths Mirro r x axis

MEMS array

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1,2..,W

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Semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA)

A SOA is a pn-junction that acts as an amplifier and also as an on-off switch
Current

p-type

n-type

Optical signal

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2x2 SOA switch

Wavelength 1 is split into two optical signals, and each signal is directed to a different SOA. One SOA amplifies the optical signal and permits it to go through, and the other one stops it. As a result 1 may leave from either the upper or the lower output port. Switching time is currently about 100 psec.
Polymer waveguides SOAs Polymer waveguides

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