Technology Overview

In many applications such as elastic optical networking (EON) [1], elastic RF-Optical Networking (ERON) [2], THz Analog-to-Digital/Digital-to-Analog Converters, and THz-wave LIDARs, we need arbitrary waveform generation and detection spanning THz bandwidth and beyond. UC Davis has developed methods for dynamic optical arbitrary waveform generation (OAWG) and measurements (OAWM) [3]. As Figure 1 illustrates, spectral-slice based dynamic OAWG can create continuous, high-fidelity waveforms that overcome the limitations of rapidly updating the modulations to a line-byline pulse shaper. Spectral-slice dynamic OAWG utilizes the parallel synthesis and coherent combination of many lower bandwidth spectral slices to create broadband data waveform. In contrast to multicarrier systems, the spectral slice bandwidth is not related to the subcarrier bandwidth of generated waveforms. This removes any restrictions on the subcarrier bandwidth and its modulation format and is only limited by the total operational bandwidth of the OAWG transmitter. The parallel nature of this transmitter structure enables bandwidth scalability without increasing the bandwidth demand on the supporting electronics. As Figure 2 shows, the complementary receiver is optical arbitrary waveform measurement (OAWM) [4], in which a broadband, continuous bandwidth waveform is divided into many spectral slices for parallel measurement using independent digital coherent receivers [3-22].

Figure 1. Dynamic optical arbitrary waveform generation principle [23].
Figure 2. Dynamic optical waveform generation (DOAWG shown on the left side) and dynamic optical waveform measurement (DOAWM shown on the right side) utilizing optical frequency combs.


Current Research Activities
Following the design and fabrication of the first monolithic 100 GHz OAWG device demonstration on an InP platform, we realized 1 THz 100-channel × 10-GHz OAWG device monolithically integrated on a 2 inch InP wafer. Inset shows two polarization maintaining fiber arrays interfacing with Michelson interferometer EAM devices as shown in Figure 3 [24]. We are currently investigating silicon photonic OAWG/OAWM devices illustrated in Figure 4. As also noted in SVBT technology description, we are developing and implementing digital signal processing for high fidelity waveform generation and detection.

Figure 3. Device layout and photograph of a single 100-channel × 10-GHz OAWG device monolithically integrated on a 2 inch InP wafer. Inset shows two polarization maintaining fiber arrays interfacing with Michelson interferometer EAM devices [5] [24].
Figure 4. Silicon photonic OAWG/OAWM devices.

References

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  2. Lu, H., et al. mmWave Beamforming using Photonic Signal Processing for Future 5G Mobile Systems. in Optical Fiber Communication Conference. 2018. San Diego, California: Optical Society of America.
  3. Fontaine, N.K., et al., Demonstration of high-fidelity dynamic optical arbitrary waveform generation. Optics Express, 2010. 18(22): p. 22988-22995.
  4. Fontaine, N.K., et al., Real-time full-field arbitrary optical waveform measurement. Nature Photonics, 2010. 4(4): p. 248-254.
  5. Geisler, D.J., et al., Demonstration of a Flexible Bandwidth Optical Transmitter/Receiver System Scalable to Terahertz Bandwidths. Ieee Photonics Journal, 2011. 3(6): p. 1013-1022.
  6. Geisler, D.J., et al. Generation and detection of arbitrary modulation format, coherent optical waveforms scalable to a terahertz. in Photonics Society Summer Topical Meeting Series, 2011 IEEE. 2011.
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  10. Scott, R.P., et al., Dynamic optical arbitrary waveform generation and measurement. Optics Express, 2010. 18(18): p. 18655-18670.
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  12. Geisler, D.J., et al., 400-Gb/s Modulation-Format-Independent Single-Channel Transmission With Chromatic Dispersion Precompensation Based on OAWG. IEEE Photonics Technology Letters, 2010. 22(12): p. 905-907.
  13. He, T., et al. Modulation-format transparent optical arbitrary waveform generation based optical-label switching transmitter with all-optical label extraction using FBG. 2009.
  14. Geisler, D.J., et al. 3 b/s/Hz 1.2 Tb/s packet generation using optical arbitrary waveform generation based optical transmitter. in Optical Fiber Communication Conference. 2009. San Diego, California.
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  17. Fontaine, N.K., et al., Near quantum-limited, single-shot coherent arbitrary optical waveform measurements. Optics Express, 2009. 17(15): p. 12332-12344.
  18. Scott, R.P., et al., Rapid updating of optical arbitrary waveforms via time-domain multiplexing. Optics Letters, 2008. 33(10): p. 1068-1070.
  19. R. P. Scott, N.K.F., C. Yang, D. J. Geisler, K. Okamoto, J. P. and a.S.J.B.Y. Heritage, Rapid updating of optical arbitrary waveforms via time-domain multiplexing. Opt. Lett. , 2008. 33: p. 1068-1070.
  20. Jiang, W., et al. A monolithic InP-based photonic integrated circuit for optical arbitrary waveform generation. 2008.
  21. Fontaine, N.K., et al., Compact 10 GHz loopback arrayed-waveguide grating for high-fidelity optical arbitrary waveform generation. Optics Letters, 2008. 33(15): p. 1714-1716.
  22. Fontaine, N.K., et al., 32 phase X 32 amplitude optical arbitrary waveform generation. Optics Letters, 2007. 32(7): p. 865-867.
  23. Fontaine, N.K., Optical Arbitrary Waveform Generation and Measurement, in Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. 2010, Univeristy of California: Davis.
  24. Soares, F.M., et al., Monolithic InP 100-Channel X 10-GHz Device for Optical Arbitrary Waveform Generation. IEEE Photonics Journal, 2011. 3(6): p. 975-985.