Arrayed Waveguide Grating Crosstalk Research Articles

PAM Performance Analysis in Multicast-Enabled Wavelength-Routing Data Centers

Multilevel pulse amplitude modulation ( $M$ -PAM) is gaining momentum for high-capacity and power-efficient cloud computing. Compared to the classic on–off keying (OOK) modulation, high-order PAM yields better spectral efficiency but is also more susceptible to physical layer degradation effects. We develop a cross-layer analysis framework to examine the PAM transmission performance in data center network environments supporting both optical multicasting and wavelength routing. Our analysis is conducted on a switch architecture based on an arrayed-waveguide grating (AWG) core and distributed broadcast domains, exhibiting different physical paths, and random, uncontrolled crosstalk noise. Reed–Solomon coding with rate adaptation is incorporated into PAM transceivers to compensate for impairments. Our Monte Carlo simulations point to the significant impact of AWG crosstalk on higher order PAM in wavelength-reuse architectures and the importance of code rate adaptation for signals traversing multiple routing stages. According to our study, 8-PAM offers the highest effective bit rates for signals terminating in one broadcast domain and performs poorly when considering interdomain connectivity. On the other hand, the impairment-induced degradation of interdomain capacity for 4-PAM can be limited to 20.7%, making it better suited for connections spanning two broadcast domains and a crosstalk-rich stage. Our results call for software-defined PAM transceiver designs in support of both modulation order and code rate adaptation.

Analysis of Large-Scale Multi-Stage All-Optical Packet Switching Routers

All-optical packet switching can overcome limitations of electronic switches in terms of power consumption, speed, cost, and footprint. Switch architectures combining wavelength converters and fiber delay lines provide tunable routing and contention resolution when used with an N×N arrayed waveguide grating (AWG), a key passive optical component to bypass electronic processing limitations. An AWG passively routes either single or multiple input port wavelengths to output ports. A single wavelength per port strategy reduces crosstalk within the AWG, but drastically increases the dimensionality of the device. AWG design constraints due to bandwidth limitations and fabrication processes limit the port number for the foreseeable future to under 100. In order to scale optical switches to emerging network requirements, we must use multiple wavelengths per port. In this paper, we examine several optical router architectures for data center applications using multiple wavelengths per port, and quantify the physical layer impairments. We consider not only the AWG crosstalk, but also Q-factor degradation caused by the multiple wavelength conversions occurring when a packet is buffered for contention resolution. We present the results as a function of the number of recirculations for on–off-keying (OOK) signal formats. While previous work has addressed this issue in terms of accumulated loss, we focus on accumulated intensity noise due to crosstalk and amplified spontaneous emission (ASE). We compare the routing performance of each architecture, and we point out that the AWG crosstalk and accumulated ASE noise during packet recirculation are both critical to the routing performance.

Optimization of Optical Add-Drop Multiplexers Based on Arrayed Waveguide Gratings with Fabrication Errors for Transparent Optical Networks

A transparent optical network (TON) composed by optical add-drop multiplexers based on arrayed waveguide grating (AWG) with fabrication errors is optimized for 10 Gbit/s per channel and channel spacing of 25 GHz. The optimization takes into account the effect of inter-symbol interference, amplified spontaneous emission noise accumulation, and coherent and incoherent homodyne crosstalk. Numerical results reveal that AWG fabrication errors can have a high influence on the TON performance; however, in all investigated situations, they do not affect the AWG parameters values corresponding to the optimum AWG frequency response. This surprising behavior is due to the fabrication errors affect mainly the AWG response outside the passband for the required AWG crosstalk level. It is shown that the optimum AWG frequency response is a flat-top response with a mean amplitude response outside the passband lower than −30 dB and the switch isolation should exceed 30 dB.

Crosstalk enhancement of AWG fabricated by flame hydrolysis deposition method

The crosstalk of arrayed-waveguide grating (AWG) multi/demultiplexer has been reduced through the modification of the torch for flame hydrolysis deposition (FHD) process. The conventional type FHD torch was changed into a precursor-premixed type torch, which enhanced the AWG crosstalk level by 5-8 dB. The results were also compared with the characteristics of AWGs of which the core layers were fabricated by the plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition process.

Very low crosstalk arrayed-waveguide grating multi/demultiplexerusing cascade connection technique

A 16-channel arrayed-waveguide grating (AWG) multi/demultiplexer has been developed which has a very low crosstalk level, based on a cascade connection technique. By connecting 16 AWG-based bandpass filters integrated on one chip and optimising the filter's spectral profile, the 16-channel AWG crosstalk has been improved from –34 dB to –60 dB.

A novel bidirectional add/drop amplifier (BADA)

We demonstrate a novel bidirectional add/drop amplifier (BADA) module by using only one N/spl times/N arrayed-waveguide grating (AWG). For the effective transmission of bidirectional signals, it is essential to suppress the relative intensity noise caused by Rayleigh backscattering, multiple reflection, and/or AWG crosstalk. The proposed amplifier module can suppress the relative intensity noise simply by using two optical bandpass filters. No degradation was observed in the receiver sensitivity when these amplifier modules were used for the bidirectional transmission and add/drop multiplexing of wavelength-division-multiplexing signals.