Management of nonlinearity in modern optical fiber transmission

Abstract

Optical fiber transport networks have been evolving rapidly to meet the demands of today's telecommunications such as unprecedented transmission capacity and reach. Fiber nonlinearity becomes an important issue as the transmission capacity and reach increase, and appropriate management of fiber nonlinearity is necessary. We review the progresses on some novel techniques for managing fiber nonlinearity in modern optical transmission systems. Advanced optical modulation techniques that allow optical signals to have high tolerance to both inter-channel and intra-channel nonlinear effects will be discussed. In particular, differential phase-shift keying (DPSK) and its impact in high-speed dense wavelength-division-multiplexing (DWDM) systems will be described. Novel dispersion management methods that suppress nonlinear effects will also be reviewed, particularly in the context of scalable and transparent optical transport networks having mixed 10 Gb/s and 40 Gb/s DWDM channels and optical add/drop multipliers (OADM). Electronic techniques that compensate for fiber nonlinearity at the transmitter side and the receiver side will be briefly discussed.