Cladding pumped few-mode EDFA for mode division multiplexed transmission

Abstract

We experimentally demonstrate a few-mode erbium doped fiber amplifier (FM-EDFA) supporting 6 spatial modes with a cladding pumped architecture. Average modal gains are measured to be >20dB between 1534nm-1565nm with a differential modal gain of ~3dB among the mode groups and noise figures of 6-7dB. The cladding pumped FM-EDFA offers a cost effective alternative to core-pumped variant as low cost, high power multimode pumps can be used, and offers performance, scalability and simplicity to FM-EDFA design.

Review of Space-Division Multiplexing Technologies in Optical Communications

“…One of proposed solution is cladding pumping, similar to that in the MC-amplifier [106]. The latest report of the MM-amplifier achieving 10-mode amplification, which adopted side-pump coupling with the cladding pumping scheme, is shown in Fig.…”

Amplification of 12 OAM Modes in an air-core erbium doped fiber

“…>10W) available from multimode pump diodes and a much lower cost compared with the single-mode pump diode in term of $/W [9]. The cladding pumping scheme had already been experimentally demonstrated as an efficient and practical way to provide pump sharing for multiple spatial channels in multi-core EDFAs [14,15], 6-spatial-mode EDFA [9] and few-mode multielement EDFAs [16]. The pump light can be side coupled into the double-clad active fiber using a tapered multimode pump fiber [15].…”

“…The development of in-line OAM mode amplifiers is essential for the serious consideration of fiber communication network based on OAM modes. Similar to few-mode erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (FM-EDFAs) [9,10] used in few-mode transmission, the differential modal gain (DMG) for independent OAM modes will be a key characteristic of OAM EDFAs and must be minimized to optimize the system performance.…”

Fiber Amplifiers for SDM Systems

“…As with MC-EDFAs, the adoption of claddingpumping provides significant practical advantages, in particular in terms of facilitating fully-integrated amplifier devices without the requirement for mode multiplexing and demultiplexing devices and providing significant component sharing opportunities and hence cost reduction, Initial results in this direction have now been reported [15] and associated system experiments demonstrated [16] The DMG can be engineered by: i) tailoring the radial erbium-doping concentration profile of the erbium doped fibre, ii) controlling the pump field intensity distribution and (iii) controlling the signal mode profile. Fig.…”