Enhanced analog-optical link performance with noiseless phase-sensitive fiber optical parametric amplifiers.

Abstract

In this paper, we investigate the enhancement of analog optical link performance with noiseless phase-sensitive fiber optical parametric amplifiers. The influence of different noise sources in the link impacts the quality of analog optical signals, especially with low optical signal power, which has not been investigated before. Theoretically, the increase in signal-to-noise ratio and spurious-free dynamic range can be up to ∼6 dB and ∼4 dB, respectively, if the noise figure of optical pre-amplifier drops 3 dB when the received optical power is less than -65 dBm. In addition, experiments based on a 1.3 dB-noise-figure phase-sensitive fiber optical parametric amplifier and conventional optical pre-amplifiers are implemented, and the measured results agree with the theoretical expectations. This illustrates that noiseless phase-sensitive optical amplification may pave the way to long-haul distribution of analog optical signals and find applications in microwave-photonic systems.