Few-mode Erbium-doped Fiber Amplifier Research Articles

Performance evaluation of a two-stage few-mode EDFA for high-capacity SDM systems

Space division multiplexing (SDM) systems using few-mode fibers (FMF) are essential for next-generation fiber optic communications. Optical amplifiers with low noise, minimal differential modal gain (DMG), and minimal differential spectral gain (DSG) are essential for these systems. In this work, we present a method to design and optimize a two-stage few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA) using a joint DMG-DSG minimization approach. This methodology involves the pumping profile design and the gain flattening filter design. Simulation results show the two-stage FM-EDFA achieves DMG and DSG below 2.8 dB and 0.42 dB, respectively, with an optical signal-to-noise ratio above 19 dB across the C-band, enabling a system capacity of 48.6 Tbps. This work reveals the effectiveness of this two-stage FM-EDFA for optical amplification in the context of SDM systems.

A low heat release cladding pump coupler

Few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (FM-EDFAs) have opened up the possibility of realizing the next generation of high-capacity, high-rate communication systems. However, the leakage of pump light during continuous operation of the FM-EDFA is likely to cause the temperature of the cladding pump coupler to be too high and thus destabilize the amplifier. In this work, a low heat release cladding pump coupler was designed and the corresponding FM-EDFA was constructed. The cladding pump coupler in the 8 hours of continuous operation of the FM-EDFA is at 27.8 °C for maximum, 23.7 °C for minimum, and 26 °C for average temperatures, respectively, which are in a low-temperature safe transmission state. The FM-EDFA performance test was performed on this basis, and the results show that when the input pump power is 7 W, the maximum gain fluctuation of each mode of FM-EDFA at 1550 nm in 0∼8 hours is only 1.5 dB, the gain of all modes is greater than 23 dB and the differential mode gain (DMG) is less than 2 dB. In addition, the FM-EDFA still has good performance in the C-band after 8 hours of continuous operation. The gain for all modes is greater than 21 dB, DMG is less than 2 dB, and wavelength flatness is 3.6 dB. The low heat release cladding pump coupler is conducive to the stable amplification transmission of FM-EDFA, which is of great significance to achieving the upgrading and expansion of the communication system.

LP-mode diversity method for the beating model of FM-EDFAs with comparison between different beat lengths

The mode beating effects can be considered for improving the modeling accuracy of few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (FM-EDFAs). A linearly polarized (LP) mode diversity method for the beating model of FM-EDFAs is proposed in the paper, in which each vector mode is always decomposed into the x- and y-polarized LP components in erbium-doped fibers and then the mode interference effects between the co-polarized LP modes associated with different vector modes act on the erbium-ion population profile. The power evolution of mode as an example is firstly analyzed for three cases of long, moderate and short beat lengths, in comparison with the intensity model. It is shown that the FM-EDFA with a moderate beat length has a potential advantage in gain control and the intensity model is equivalent to the case with the long beat length. The simultaneous amplification of and modes are then investigated for the moderate beat lengths and the modal gain can approximately be expressed by that of the intensity model and a cosine function of the beat length. The similar analysis process is also applied to other beating scenarios, such as the simultaneous amplification of , and modes.

Modal gain characteristics of few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifiers with pump mode beating

Using the linear polarization (LP) mode decomposition method, we theoretically analyze the beat effect between the same polarization components of the vector pump modes and propose a pump beat model of few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (FM-EDFAs). The relationship of the overlap factor with the signal gain in the beat model is verified by the amplification of LP01 and LP11 modes for the first time, that is, the differential modal gain (DMG) is dependent on the integral of the overlap factor difference over the EDF length. We also simulate the effect of pump mode beating on signal amplification: the modal gain varies periodically with the pump mode phase, and the beat length can affect the fluctuation period and amplitude of the DMG. The DMG can further be reduced by controlling the initial phases of the vector modes and properly designing the beat length of the FM-EDF. The similar process can expand to more signal modes, such as the simultaneous amplification of LP01x, LP11ex, LP11oy, LP21ex and LP21oy modes. The LP mode decomposition method is also applied to the beat effect between signal modes or the amplification of orbital angular momentum (OAM) modes. One can expect to implement an experiment on the FM-EDFA amplification with pump mode beating by optimally designing the FM-EDF structure, using a properly narrow linewidth pump laser and precisely controlling the pump mode coherence.

All-fiber spatial and wavelength gain-flattening of few-mode EDFA via mode selective coupler

The mode division multiplexing (MDM) technique together with wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) shows the great prospect to solve the capacity crunch of current standard single mode fiber (SSMF) transmission system. However, the modal and wavelength gain fluctuation fundamentally limit both the capacity and the reach of hybrid MDM-WDM transmission system. Here, we propose an all-fiber few-mode gain-flattening filter (FM-GFF) based on mode selective coupler (MSC), to effectively mitigate the gain fluctuation of few-mode erbium doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA) in both spatial and wavelength dimensions. With the help of genetic algorithm (GA), variable mode dependent loss spectra of cascaded MSCs can be efficiently obtained, according to the gain profile of the used FM-EDFA. Consequently, gain-flattening among all guided linearly polarized (LP) mode groups over the C-band can be realized. Simulation results reveal that, as for the spatial and wavelength gain flattening among 4/6-LP mode groups, only 5/7 cascaded MSCs are good enough to mitigate the modal and wavelength gain fluctuation from 9.89 dB and 11.79-dB to less than 0.38 dB and 0.46 dB over the C-band. Finally, we carry out experimental verification based on 2-LP mode groups gain flattening over C-band. When 3 cascaded MSCs are involved, the gain fluctuation of FM-EDFA over the C-band can be flattened from 2.46 dB to less than 0.96 dB.

Low-modal-crosstalk doped-fiber amplifiers in few-mode-fiber-based systems

Independent light propagation through one or multiple modes is commonly considered as a basic demand for mode manipulation in few-mode fiber (FMF)- or multimode fiber (MMF)-based optical systems such as transmission links, optical fiber lasers, or distributed optical fiber sensors. However, the insertion of doped-fiber amplifiers always kills the entire effort by inducing significant modal crosstalk. In this paper, we propose the design of doped-fiber amplifiers in FMF-based systems adopting identical multiple-ring-core (MRC) index profiles for both passive and doped fibers to achieve low modal crosstalk. We develop the direct-glass-transition (DGT) modified chemical vapor deposition (MCVD) processing for precise fabrication of few-mode erbium-doped fibers (FM-EDFs) with MRC profiles of both refractive index and erbium-ion doping distribution. Then, a few-mode erbium-doped-fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA) with a maximum gain of 26.08 dB and differential modal gain (DMG) of 2.3 dB is realized based on fabricated FM-EDF matched with a transmission FMF supporting four linearly polarized (LP) modes. With the insertion of the FM-EDFA, 60 + 60 km simultaneous LP01/LP11/LP21/LP02 transmission without inter-modal multiple-input multiple-output digital signal processing (MIMO-DSP) is successfully demonstrated. The proposed design of low-modal-crosstalk doped-fiber amplifiers provides, to our knowledge, new insights into mode manipulation methods in various applications.

Detailed characterization of a high-gain, low differential modal gain and low gain flatness integrated FM-EDFA for multi-wavelength amplification

In this paper, an integrated few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA), with high gain, low differential modal gain (DMG), and low gain flatness for multi-wavelength amplification, is constructed using homemade weakly-coupled ring-core few-mode erbium-doped fiber (FM-EDF) and low insertion-loss passive components. The gain characteristics of the FM-EDFA for multi-wavelength amplification are analyzed in detail and compared with single-wavelength amplification. The experimental results demonstrate that, although multi-wavelength amplification in different modes has an impact on the gain characteristics, through simple LP01 core pumping only, all guided modes can achieve a gain higher than 22.4 dB when simultaneously amplifying 8 wavelength channels. The DMG is less than 1.179 dB, the minimum DMG across the C-band is as low as 0.168 dB, and the wavelength gain flatness is less than 3.232 dB. Furthermore, when the three-signal mode is multiplexed for amplification, the DMG can be stabilised at less than 2 dB. The constructed FM-EDFA can achieve gain equalization in multi-wavelength amplification across the C-band, which has essential practical applications in long-haul WDM-MDM transmission systems.

Simultaneous realization of high gain and low DMG of four-mode EDFA under bidirectional hybrid-mode pump.

We theoretically and experimentally verify that, the bidirectional hybrid-mode pumping scheme can address the optimization problem of trade-off between high gain and low differential modal gain (DMG) of four-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (4M-EDFA), in comparison with traditional both forward and backward hybrid-mode pumping scheme. It is noticed that, when the total pump power is fixed, the bidirectional hybrid-mode pumping scheme can not only achieve higher gain, but also suppress DMG due to different overlap integrals for the forward and backward pumping schemes. The bidirectional hybrid-mode pumped 4M-EDFA is developed with the forward pumping at LP02 mode and the backward pumping at LP21 mode, under a pump power ratio of 30%:70%. Thus, we can achieve an average gain of up to 21.16 dB and a low DMG of 0.43 dB at 1550 nm, and an average gain of up to 20.64 dB with a DMG of less than 1.6 dB over the C-band. In particular, the bidirectional hybrid-mode pumping scheme allows us to tailor the gain characteristics of the few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (FM-EDFAs), by adjusting the power ratio between forward and backward pumps.

Gain equalization for a few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier supporting eight spatial modes

A trench-assisted ring few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA) supporting eight spatial modes is designed and proposed in this work. The gain equalization for the FM-EDFA is achieved by selecting the appropriate doping radius and concentration using a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm when only the pump in the fundamental mode (LP01) is applied. When the signals in the eight spatial modes are simultaneously amplified, the average modal gain is about 20 dB, and the DMG is less than 0.3 dB for a signal at 1550 nm. Considering the gain competition of six wavelength signals, the modal gain and DMG are more than 20 and 1 dB, respectively. In addition, the tolerance analysis for manufacturing with this design is also discussed. For a fluctuation in the refractive index, the average modal gain is about 19.5 dB, and the DMG is 0.77 dB, indicating that the structure has good fabrication tolerance.

A practical in-line FM-EDFA based on cladding pumping for MIMO-free MDM amplification and transmission

The amplification of the long-haul mode division multiplexing (MDM) transmission systems is currently mainly implemented by three steps due to the lack of high-performance in-line few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (FM-EDFA): firstly, the multiplexed signals need to be demultiplexed. Secondly, multiple single-mode EDFAs are used to amplify the modes separately. Finally, the signals are re-multiplexed into the few-mode fiber for transmission. The multi-stage multiplexing and demultiplexing bring significant complexity and additional modal crosstalk, resulting in degraded transmission performance. To address this issue, an in-line FM-EDFA based on cladding pumping is proposed for simultaneous amplification and transmission in MDM systems. The direct connection of the in-line FM-EDFA to the transmission FMFs reduces the need for mode multiplexing/demultiplexing devices, which provides excellent stability and applicability for MDM transmission systems. The experimental results show that the modal gains of in-line FM-EDFA can reach 21 dB with a differential modal gain (DMG) of less than 0.9 dB. Moreover, the in-line FM-EDFA is applied for simultaneous amplification and transmission in a weakly-coupled MDM system with MIMO-free direct detection. The modal crosstalk of the in-line FM-EDFA is less than −11 dB. Therefore, the in-line cladding-pumped FM-EDFA provides good integration to the fiber links, showing much potential in practical long-haul transmission systems.

Experimental evaluation on OSNR and DMG performance of cascade FM-EDFA systems by equivalent input spectrum method

An all-fiber few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA) is constructed by the integration of few-mode isolator wavelength division multiplexers (FM-IWDMs), which act as the multiplexing or demultiplexing function between signal and pump light. The gain performance of the FM-EDFAs under forward, bidirectional and backward pumping cases is investigated by experiment. For LP01, LP11e and LP11o-mode signals, the minimum differential mode gain (DMG) of 0.14 dB can be achieved by forward LP11e and LP11o-mode pumping. We propose the equivalent input spectrum method to experimentally simulate the cascade FM-EDFA systems. For the three-mode amplification, the optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) and overall DMG after 8-stage transmission are respectively 13.89 dB and 1.59 dB, which may theoretically support 1000 km-long transmission of 100 Gb/s DP-QPSK signal. A cascade amplification system composed of six-mode EDFA with the DMG of 1.35 dB is also considered to verify the feasibility of the equivalent input spectrum method.

Hybrid-Pumped Few-Mode Erbium-Doped Fiber Amplifier for Gain Equalization

Hybrid-Pumped Few-Mode Erbium-Doped Fiber Amplifier for Gain Equalization

High-power, low noise, high gain few-mode fiber amplifier

The few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA) is a necessary component for high-capacity long-haul mode-division multiplexing (MDM) fiber optic communication systems. In this paper, an all-fiber few-mode amplifier based on erbium-ytterbium co-doped double-clad fiber is designed and demonstrated. We have developed a fiber-optic pump beam combiner and a few-mode isolator. Combined with the two-stage cascade method, an all-fiber few-mode fiber amplifier with high-power, high-gain and low-noise is realized. Simultaneous amplification of 6 modes (LP01, LP11a, LP11b LP21a, LP21b and LP02) are achieved in the 1535–1565 nm range with average modal gain greater than 40 dB, maximum saturated output power up to 29.5 dBm, differential modal gain (DMG) of ∼3 dB and minimum noise figure (NF) of 4.69 dB.

Experimental investigation on transmission system of dual-polarization mode-division-multiplexing signals with few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifiers

The transmission capacity of optical fiber communication can be effectively improved by the combination of dual-polarization (DP) high-order modulation format with mode division multiplexing (MDM) technology. We build up an experimental system for amplification and transmission of DP-MDM signals with orthogonal mode combination (OMC) and identical mode combination (IMC). The MDM transceiver units are composed of mode-selective photonic lanterns (MSPLs) and few-mode polarization controllers (FMPCs). The few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA) used here is constructed by homemade isolation and wavelength division multiplexers (IWDMs). The amplification and transmission experiments for 100 Gb/s dual-polarization quadrature phase shift keying (DP-QPSK) MDM signals are carried out by the commercial optical transport network (OTN) platform. An effective method of optimally receiving DP-MDM signals are presented by appropriately controlling the FMPC in the MDM receiver unit. The experimental results show that, (1) OMC DP-MDM signals have a better performance than IMC cases in differential modal gain (DMG), which provides a new means to reduce the DMG; and (2) under the optimization conditions, OMC and IMC DP-MDM systems possess a close receiver sensitivity, but the former has a larger optical power margin than the latter by 2.2 dB.

Few-mode erbium-doped fiber with trench and weak coupling for mode gain equalization based on layered-doping technology.

A few-mode erbium-doped fiber (FM-EDF) with a step refractive index and trench structure is designed and proposed to realize the modal gain equalization of a few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA). The layered-doping technology is used to reduce the mode gain difference (DMG). The doping radius and doping concentration are adjusted to obtain the optimum FM-EDF structure. When the designed FM-EDF is applied to the FM-EDFA, the DMG of the whole C-band is less than 0.15dB and the DMG is less than 0.12dB at 1550nm. The minimum refractive index difference (Δ n eff) between modes can be calculated according to the refractive index and radius of the fiber core; i.e.,1.35×10-3, which will greatly reduce the coupling between modes in a practical application. Tolerances in the fiber manufacturing process are also considered for reliable FM-EDFA performance. When the doping radius and concentration of each doping layer fluctuate by ±15% based on the precise value, the maximum DMG increases to 1.8dB. In general, DMG can maintain a small value, which is beneficial for application in optical communications systems.

Static analysis of gain control for a few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier employing pump power adjustment.

In mode-division multiplexing (MDM) optical transmission systems and MDM networks, the gain must be kept nearly constant even when the input signal power of the few-mode (FM), erbium-doped fiber amplifier (EDFA) changes. This paper investigates controllability of the gain in a 4-LP mode EDFA, whose EDF has signal modes of L P 01, L P 11, L P 21, and L P 02 or L P 01, L P 11, L P 21, and L P 31, by using analytical and full models. The results of calculation using the analytical model and a gain simulation using the full model show that the gain can be kept almost constant with an error less than 0.25dB simply by adjusting the L P 01 pump power of the EDFA with signal modes of L P 01, L P 11, L P 21, and L P 31. This result suggests that it is possible to control the gain simply by adjusting the pump power in FM-EDFAs where all signal modes have a radial mode number of one.

Long-distance modal power equalization with hybrid pumped FM-EDFA

In a few-mode fiber-based mode division multiplexing system, the different modes as distinct channels suffer from discrepant mode-dependent loss, leading to an intensive channel power imbalance and large bit error. The few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA) enables mode power regulation to ensure high-quality long-distance transmission. In this paper, we propose an FM-EDFA for long-haul equalization with a core and cladding hybrid pump structure. The particle swarm optimization is applied to determine the multilayered erbium ions doping profile. Based on the profile, targeted compensation for high-order modes with high loss is realized to mitigate the power difference in long-distance transmission. Compared with the single pump selection, the differential modal gain reduces from 6.553 dB to 1.239 dB in the hybrid pump with a 1000 km multistage amplification and transmission. We provide new ideas for loss compensation and power balance in long-distance transmission. This method has the ability of dynamic power adjustment while keeping the design simple.

Design of few-mode erbium-doped fiber with a low differential modal gain and weak coupling based on layered doping.

A step index few-mode erbium-doped fiber (FM-EDF) for mode gain equalization is designed and proposed in this paper, which uses the layered-doping method to reduce the differential mode gain (DMG). The optimum structure of FM-EDF is obtained by adjusting the doping radius and doping concentration. When this structure is applied to a few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA), the DMG in the range of 1550-1565nm is ∼0.28d B, and the DMG of the whole C-band is usually less than 0.5dB. At the same time, the gain of each mode in 1530-1555nm is ∼20d B, while the gain decreases gradually in the 1555-1565nm due to the absorption characteristics of erbium ions. In addition, the minimum refractive index difference (Δ n eff) between modes is 1.29∗10-3 due to the selection of the refractive index and radius of the fiber core, which will greatly reduce the coupling between modes in practical application. Tolerances in the fiber manufacturing process are also considered for reliable FM-EDFA performance. When the doping concentration or the doping radius changes based on the precise value, the DMG will increase to a certain extent. In general, the DMG can maintain a small value, which is beneficial to applications in optical communication systems.

Few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifier based on a multi-inclusions core optical fiber.

In this work, we demonstrate and evaluate a new design of micro-structured core erbium-doped few-mode fiber to be used as optical amplifier in the context of mode-division multiplexing. This concept is proposed so as to better control the distribution of the Er3+ ions in the core area, thus permitting to adjust the overall differential modal gains between the different signal modes. The design presented here consists of 19 erbium-doped inclusions embedded in a pedestal geometry guiding 10 modes in the C-band. It has been optimized numerically so as to reach the equalized amplification of all the signal modes. The fiber has been realized and combined with custom-made dual-wavelength mode multiplexers based on multi-plane light conversion to shape the signal and pump beams. Amplification properties have finally been evaluated experimentally.

Transmission Experiment of High-Speed DP-QPSK Mode Division Multiplexing Signals with Few-Mode Erbium-Doped Fiber Amplifier

Transmission Experiment of High-Speed DP-QPSK Mode Division Multiplexing Signals with Few-Mode Erbium-Doped Fiber Amplifier