Experimental comparison of PMD-induced system penalty models

Abstract

We present experimental investigations of polarization-mode dispersion (PMD)-induced system penalties arising from an all-order PMD source, for amplified spontaneous emission and thermally limited systems. Further, we compare the experimental first-order PMD-induced penalties with predictions from both the string length model and the modified quadratic model. We show that the both models are in good agreement with the experimental data. The major difference between the two models is in the measurement requirements, which are less stringent for the string length method