Ultra-low-loss optical fiber enabling purely passive 10 Gb/s PON systems with 100 km length

Abstract

We demonstrate time division multiplexing (TDM) and wavelength division multiplexing/TDM (WDM/TDM) long reach 10 Gb/s passive optical network (PON) architectures of 100 km reach with no infield amplification or dispersion compensation. The purely passive nature of the 100 km systems is enabled by the use of ultra-low-loss optical fiber with average attenuation of 0.17 dB/km and downstream transmission with a 10 Gb/s signal modulated with the duobinary format. The high tolerance of duobinary to dispersion, stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS), and self-phase modulation (SPM) are all key factors to achieving good system performance at this distance, as is the significantly reduced loss from the ultra-low-loss fiber. We show that this combination of fiber and downstream signal format allow split ratios up to 1:128 for both system architectures. The achievable split ratio is reduced for standard single-mode fiber and/or use of an NRZ modulated downstream signal. Standard strength forward error correction (FEC) is used for the WDM/TDM system but is not required for the TDM system.