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Effect of Frequency Chirping On The Performance of Optical Communication Systems
Effect of Frequency Chirping On The Performance of Optical Communication Systems
5 / May 1986
M. J. Potasek
AT&T Engineering Research Center, Princeton, New Jersey 08540
The effect of frequency chirping on the performance of optical communication systems is analyzed theoretically
using a simple but realistic model for the chirped pulses emitted by a directly modulated semiconductor laser. The
effect of pulse-edge sharpness is investigated by considering the propagation of super-Gaussian chirped pulses in a
dispersive single-mode fiber. The results are presented using the parameter values appropriate for a 1.55-/im
optical communication system employing conventional silica fibers and are in qualitative agreement with the
OA+
reported experimental observations.
Current interest in high-bit-rate optical communica- If the power-dependent nonlinear effects are ig-
tion systems requires the propagation of short optical nored, the propagation of optical pulses in single-
pulses in optical fibers. As pulses get shorter with an mode fibers is governed by8
increase in the bit rate, chromatic dispersion in single-
mode fibers becomes increasingly more important and ( *A) - 1 0(2) a2A = 0, (1)
plays a detrimental role in limiting the performance of
light-wave transmission systems.1'2 For conventional where A is the complex amplitude of the pulse enve-
silica fibers, considerable dispersion (-15-20 psec lope, -y is the amplitude-absorption coefficient, and
nm- 1 km-') occurs in the vicinity of the 1.55-,Mmwave- = d2 ,3/dc2 accounts for the group-velocity disper-
M(2)
length where the fiber loss is minimum. For such sion. For conventional silica fibers, p3(2) is negative
1.55-Mmcommunication systems, the modulation-in- near the loss-minimum wavelength of 1.55 um (anom-
duced frequency chirping becomes important since it alous dispersion). Owing to its linearity, Eq. (1) has
increases the pulse spectral width over its Fourier- the general solution
transform-limited value. Attempts have been made
to estimate theoretically the importance of the chirp
effects by considering pulse propagation in single-
mode dispersive fibers.3 - 6 However, the results are
A(z, ,) = e-z J A(0, w)exp[i( r + 2 (3(2)W2z)] dw,
(2)
often obtained using Gaussian pulses with a linear
frequency chirp. In practice, the optical pulses are far where
from being Gaussian and have much sharper leading
and trailing edges. Further, the time-resolved mea-
surements7 of the pulse spectrum have shown that the
A(0, co)= 2- J A(0, r) exp(-iwr)dr (3)
frequency chirping in directly modulated semiconduc- and A(0, r) is the initial pulse amplitude at the launch
tor lasers occurs mainly near the leading and trailing plane z = 0.
edges. As a consequence, the linear chirp model used The integrals appearing in Eqs. (2) and (3) can be
in previous work3 -6 may not be suitable to account for evaluated analytically for a Gaussian pulse with linear
the chirp effects. chirp. However, as mentioned earlier, such a form
In this Letter we consider the pulse propagation in does not model the experimental situation well. We
dispersive fibers using a more realistic model for the have found that most of the deficiencies of the Gauss-
temporal shape and the frequency chirp associated ian model can be overcome by adopting the super-
with the incident pulse. A generalization of the Gaussian model wherein the initial pulse amplitude is
Gaussian model (the super-Gaussian model) provides given by
pulses whose rise time is controllable. At the same
time, it leads to a description of frequency chirping
that is consistent with the experimental observations.7 A(0, r) = AOexp[- 1 (1 - ia) (r/)i2m]. (4)
Our results show that the dispersive effects depend
critically on the sharpness of leading and trailing Here AOis the peak amplitude, a is the half-width (at
edges. We discuss how the pulse shape is affected lie intensity point), and a is a chirp parameter. In the
during propagation and compare the results obtained case of directly modulated semiconductor lasers, a is
using Gaussian and super-Gaussian models. often referred to as the linewidth enhancement fac-
tor,9 and its estimated numerical value for 1.5 5-Am 1.25
Av(,r) = -
1Av = =_
0k
1 __ _=- _ ma_ /2m-1 =_ a d(nP),
4
2rar 27ra~~r ,7r dt 0.25
(6) 0
-400 -200 0 200 400
where P = IAl2
is the modulated optical power. The TIME (psec)
2
BD product decreases with an increase in a and with a
a
2 125 psec decrease in the pulse rise time. For unchirped pulses
a5
1.8 - SUPERGAUSSIAN (a = 0), Fig. 3 shows that the 4-Gbit sec-1 transmission
GAUSSIAN
can be accomplished for fiber lengths as long as 200
1.6 km. This is in agreement with the recent 117-km
transmission experiments that made use of external
modulation to avoid frequency chirping. For directly
0~ ~~~~~~~~- modulated semiconductor lasers Fig, 3 predicts a fiber
length of only 18 km if we accept the value a = 5. This
conclusion is in apparent contradiction with a trans-
mission experiment' 3 in which a fiber length of 103 km
was used. To resolve the discrepancy, we note from
Eq. (7) that for parameter values used in Fig. 3, the
100
0 20 40 60 80
frequency chirp APvm 20 GHz. In Ref. 13, the semi-
FIBER LENGTH (km)
conductor laser was biased considerably above thresh-
Fig. 2. Broadening of a 125-psechalf-width pulse with the old to reduce APm below 10 GHz. Since the pulse
fiber length for three values of the chirp parameter aeusing D intensity in the off state was about 1/3 of the peak
= 16 psec nm-1 km-'. Solid and dashed curves correspond value, the results presented here are not applicable.
to super-Gaussian (m = 3) and Gaussian (m = 1) pulse To conclude, we have used a simple but realistic
shapes. model for the chirped pulses emitted by a directly
modulated semiconductor laser. The model is used to
1000 investigate the performance of 1.55-Mimoptical com-
I munication systems by considering the pulse propaga-
500
tion in a linear dispersive medium. Particular atten-
103 Z
E
tion is paid to the effects of frequency chirping and of
(0
I-
::
0 edge sharpness (rise and fall times). For characteris-
M
3 100 0 tic chirp profiles commonly encountered in semicon-
A1: