Orbital angular momentum communications based on standard multi-mode fiber (invited paper)

Jun Liu,Jian Wang,Shi Chen

doi:10.1063/5.0049022

Jun Liu, Jian Wang + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0049022

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Abstract

Orbital angular momentum (OAM) modes, having unique properties of a helical phase structure and doughnut intensity profile, have been widely studied in fiber-optic communications, in terms of OAM modulation and OAM multiplexing. In general, different types of specialty fibers with a ring-shape structure are preferred for more stable OAM transmission, which, however, may face greater manufacturing challenge and larger fiber loss compared to standard multi-mode fibers (MMFs). Therefore, the widely deployed and commercially available standard MMFs that can support hundreds of OAM modes have recently attracted great attention. In this paper, we review recent research progress in OAM communications based on standard MMFs. First, the basic concept of OAM and different types of specially designed OAM fibers are briefly introduced. Then, the OAM mode properties in MMFs and recent works, including OAM mode modulation, multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO)-free OAM mode group multiplexing, small-scale partial MIMO assisted OAM mode multiplexing, and OAM-based heterogeneous fiber-optic networks, are presented. The OAM communications using other widely deployed standard single-mode fibers are also briefly introduced as supplementary. Finally, key challenges and perspectives of OAM communications based on standard MMF are discussed and summarized.

Highlights

Fiber-optic communications, as the backbone of telecommunication infrastructures, have experienced tremendous capacity growth by five orders of magnitude since the first deployment four decades ago.1–3 the global Internet data traffic faces dramatic expansion
Based on the above theoretical analyses, we experimentally demonstrate Orbital angular momentum (OAM) mode modulation and multiplexing communication based on standard multi-mode fibers (MMFs)
For OAM multiplexing communication based on standard MMF, we experimentally demonstrate both multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO)-free OAM mode group multiplexing and small-scale partial MIMO assisted OAM mode multiplexing approaches

Summary

INTRODUCTION

As for the fiber-optic communications, due to the intrinsic spatial orthogonality and separability, OAM modes can form a mode set, benefiting efficient multiplexing and modulation transmission. Beyond the aforementioned specialty fibers, the solid-core FMFs can support several low-order OAM modes and have been employed for OAM mode multiplexing transmission.. Similar to FMFs, the standard MMF that can support hundreds of modes is currently under intense investigation on account of their widespread deployment in commercial telecommunication systems. Both theoretical research and proof-of-concept experimental demonstrations using OAM modes on standard MMF have been reported.. The challenges and perspectives of OAM communications based on standard MMF are discussed and summarized at the end

OAM COMMUNICATIONS ON SPECIALTY FIBERS

OAM mode properties

OAM modulation communications

OAM multiplexing communications

OAM COMMUNICATIONS ON STANDARD SMF

PERSPECTIVES

CONCLUSION