Brendan F. Kennedy, Frederic Surre, Severine Philippe, Louise Bradley, Pascal Landais

1 Departamento de Ingeniería Eléctrica. Universidad de Santiago de Chile. Santiago, Chile. E-mail: bkennedy@lauca.usach.cl

2 Department of Electronic Engineering. Dublin City University. Ireland.

3 Physics Department. Trinity College Dublin. Ireland.

RESUMEN

En los servicios de telecomunicaciones, la necesidad de hacer uso intensivo de las aplicaciones ha presionado por un constante incremento del ancho de banda. Particularmente una de las tecnologías más promisorias, que ha permitido estos incrementos de ancho de banda, son los elementos ópticos, de tal manera que en las redes de comunicación los elementos electrónicos sean sustituidos por dichos elementos ópticos. En esta publicación se discute una técnica basada en la rotación no lineal del estado de polarización de una señal óptica conectada al amplificador semiconductor óptico. Se presenta un experimento, basado en este efecto, para realizar la conversión a 2,5 Gbits/s. La característica del conversor de longitud onda es probada en propagación directa e inversa. Se ha encontrado que conversión de la longitud de onda es independiente de longitud de onda (la conversión no depende del valor de la longitud de onda) en la modalidad de propagación directa no invertida.

Palabras clave: Amplificador semiconductor óptico, conversión de la longitud de onda, rotación no lineal del estado de polarización.

ABSTRACT

As the need for higher and higher bandwidths in telecommunication systems continues, it is widely predicted that at some point in the future optical processing will need to be performed all-optically. Several techniques have been proposed to perform such all-optical signal processing. In this paper a technique based on the nonlinear rotation in the state of polarization of an optical signal injected into a bulk semiconductor optical amplifier is discussed. An experiment to perform wavelength conversion at 2.5 Gbit/s based on this effect is presented. The performance of the wavelength converter is tested in both co- and counter-propagation, and wavelength independent wavelength conversion is found in the non-inverted co-propagation setup.

Keywords: Nonlinear polarization rotation, semiconductor optical amplifier, wavelength conversion.

REFERENCES

[1] E. de Argaez. "Internet world stats". August 2007. URLs: http://www.internetworldstats.com

[2] S. Tariq, M.K. Dhodhi, J.C. Palais and R.E. Ahmed. "Next generation DWDM networks: Demands, capabilities and limitations". IEEE Canadian Conf. on Elec. and Comp. Eng. 2000. Vol. 2, pp. 1003-1007. 2000.

[3] G. Held. "On the road to OC-768" . IT Professional. Vol. 3, pp. 46-48. 2001.

[4] D. Cotter, R.J. Manning, K.J. Blow, A.D. Ellis, A.E. Kelly, D. Nesset, I.D. Phillips, A.J. Poustie and D.C. Rogers. "Nonlinear optics for high-speed digital information processing". Science. Vol. 286, pp. 1523-1528. 1999.

[5] D.M. Patrick, A.D. Ellis, D.A.O. Davies, M.C. Tatham and G. Sherlock. "Demultiplexing using polarization rotation in a semiconductor laser amplifier". IEE Electronic Letters. Vol. 30, pp. 341-342. 1994.

[6] H. Soto, D. Erasme and G. Guekos. "Cross polarization modulation in semiconductor optical amplifiers". IEEE Photonic Tech. Letters. Vol. 9, pp. 449-451. 1997.

[7] R.J. Manning, A. Antonopoulos, R. Le Roux and A.E. Kelly. "Experimental measurement of nonlinear polarization rotation in semiconductor optical amplifiers". IEE Electronic Letters. Vol. 37, pp. 229-231. 2001.

[8] G.P. Agrawal, N.A. Olsson. "Self-phase modulation and spectral broadening of optical pulses in semiconductor laser amplifiers". IEEE J. Quantum Electronics. Vol. 25, pp. 2297-2306. 1989.

[9] C.H. Henry. "Theory of the linewidth of semiconductor lasers". IEEE J. Quantum Electronics. Vol. 18, pp. 259-264. 1982.

[10] P. Dousiere, P. Garabedian, C. Graver, D. Bonnevie, T. Fillion, E. Derouin, M. Monnot, J.G. Provost, D. Leclerc and M. Klenk. "1.55?m polarization independent semiconductor optical amplifier with 25 dB fiber to fiber gain". IEEE Photonic Tech. Letters. Vol. 6, pp. 170-172. 1994.

[11] M. Itoh, Y. Shibata, T. Kakitsuka, Y. Kadota, and Y. Tohmori. "Polarization-insensitive SOA with a strained bulk active layer for network device application". IEEE Photonic Tech. Letters. Vol. 14, pp. 765-767. 2002.

[12] C. Vassallo. "Polarization-independent anti-reflection coatings for semiconductor optical amplifiers". IEE Electronic Letters. Vol. 24, pp. 61-62. 1988.

[13] Y. Liu, M.T. Hill, E. Tangdiongga, H. de Waardt, N. Calabretta, G.D. Khoe and H.J.S. Dorren. "Wavelength conversion using nonlinear polarization rotation in a single semiconductor optical amplifier". IEEE Photonic Tech. Letters. Vol. 15, pp. 90-92. 2003.

[14] L. Guo and M.J. Connelly. "Signal induced birefringence and dichroism in a tensile-strained bulk semiconductor optical amplifier and its application to wavelength conversion". IEEE J. Light. Technology. Vol. 23, pp. 4037-4045. December 2005.