Amplifier limited information rates in high-speed optical fiber communication systems

Abstract

Due to the high transmission capacity, optical fiber systems have been widely applied in the modern telecommunication infrastructure to meet the ever-increasing demand of data traffic. Optical amplifiers have been employed to amplify optical signals and to compensate for the transmission losses. They play a key role in relaying the signals in ultra-wideband optical fiber communication systems. However, the amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) noise will be introduced and will pose constraints on the transmission information rates. The mutual information (MI) and the generalized mutual information (GMI) have been applied to evaluate the information rates in communication systems. In this work, we have investigated the impact of ASE noise on the MI and the GMI, and developed corresponding analyses across different modulation formats. Our work aims to explore the limit and requirements on optical amplifiers in next-generation ultra-wideband optical fiber communication systems.