Linear optical signal processing with optical filters： a tutorial

An effective theoretical analysis method is presented to analyze different linear optical signal processing functions with optical fikers reported in literatures. For different applications, the optical filters are supposed to operate on the analog or digital part of the signal separately, namely analog spectrum conversion and digital spectrum conversion. For instance, the return-to-zero （RZ） to non-return-to-zero （NRZ） format conversion for intensity or phase modulated signals are based on the analog spectrum conversion process, while the （N）RZ to （N）RZ phase-shift-keying （PSK） format conversion, logic NOT gate and clock recovery for RZ signals are based on the digital spectrum conversion process. Theoretical analyses with the help of numerical simulation are used to verify the reported experimental results, and all the experimental results can be effectively analyzed with this analytical model. The effect of the transmission spectrum of the filter on the performance of the converted signal is investigated. The most important factor is that the theoretical analysis provides an effective way to optimize the optical filter for different optical signal processing functions.

All-Optical Signal Processing with Super-Continuum Generated from Optical Fibers

Super-continuum (SC) generated from optical fibers has many attractive applications in optical communication systems. Discussing the mechanism of wideband and flat SC generation, we describe all-optical signal processing that employs the SC.

Digital Optical Signal Amplifier Using an Er-doped Fiber Optical Bistable Device

The principle and charecteristics of verious digital optical signal amplifiers using Er doped fiber optical bistability devices have been discussed. Optical signal gain and its variation with the parameters of the devices with constant or pulse optical bias have been calculated, and the design principle of those devices has been given.

Hybrid Fiber Optical Bistability and Optical Signal Procesing

A hybrid fiber optical bistable device with electrical feedback has been proposed and analyzed.Bistability operation and some applications for optical signal processing have been realized experimentally .

Optical time-domain differentiation based on intensive differential group delay

An optical time-domain differentiation scheme is proposed and demonstrated based on the intensive differential group delay in a high birefringence fibre waveguide. Results show that the differentiation waveforms agree well with the mathematically calculated derivatives. Both error and efficiency will increase when the birefringence fibre becomes longer, and the error rises up more quickly while the efficiency approaches to a maximum of ~0.25. By using a 1-m birefringence fibre a lower error of ~0.26% is obtained with an efficiency of 1% for the first-order differentiation of 10-ps Gaussian optical pulses, and the high-order optical differentiation up to 4th order is achieved with an error less than 3%. Due to its compact structure being easy to integrate and cascade into photonic circuits, our scheme has great potential for ultrafast signal processing.

Doppler radar by using single multicarrier pulse based on optical fibre delay lines

The proposed Doppler measurement technique shows that the Doppler measurements can be accomplished by a single pulse with multiple frequency components through optical fibre delay lines.Range and velocity ambiguity can be removed,and the velocity resolution can be improved dramatically by using long optical fibre delay lines.Furthermore,the velocity resolution can be modified by adjusting the length of optical fibre delay lines.In addition,the proposed radar can achieve high range resolution by using a single wideband pulse.As a result,the new approach can improve radar performance significantly.

Single-shot incoherent optical processing of microwave signals： opening the path to low cost high performance analog photonics

Incoherent optical processing of microwave signals,where low-coherence broadband light sources are employed instead of costly mode locked lasers,has attracted great interest thanks to its wide applications in microwave photonics filtering[1–3],arbitrary generation[4–6]and analog to digital conversion[7]。

A conditioned level-set method with block-division strategy to flame front extraction based on OH-PLIF measurements

A novel approach to extract flame fronts, which is called the conditioned level-set method with block division （CLSB）, has been developed. Based on a two-phase level-set formulation, the conditioned initialization and region-lock optimiza-tion appear to be beneficial to improve the efficiency and accuracy of the flame contour identification. The original block- division strategy enables the approach to be unsupervised by calculating local self-adaptive threshold values autonomously before binarization. The CLSB approach has been applied to deal with a large set of experimental data involving swirl- stabilized premixed combustion in diluted regimes operating at atmospheric pressures. The OH-PLIF measurements have been carried out in this framework. The resulting images are, thus, featured by lower signal-to-noise ratios （SNRs） than the ideal image; relatively complex flame structures lead to significant non-uniformity in the OH signal intensity; and, the mag- nitude of the maximum OH gradient observed along the flame front can also vary depending on flow or local stoichiometry. Compared with other conventional edge detection operators, the CLSB method demonstrates a good ability to deal with the OH-PLIF images at low SNR and with the presence of a multiple scales of both OH intensity and OH gradient. The robustness to noise sensitivity and intensity inhomogeneity has been evaluated throughout a range of experimental images of diluted flames, as well as against a circle test as Ground Truth （GT）.

Influence of the nonlinear propagation effect on the optical signal-to-noise ratio of 400G optical fiber communication systems

The influence of the nonlinear propagation effect on three 400 Gb/s/ch （400G） optical fiber communication systems with typical modulation formats, dual-carrier 16-quadrature amplitude modulation （16QAM）, single-carrier 16QAM （single-16QAM）, and four-carrier quadrature phase-shift keying, are investigated. The received optical signal-to-noise ratio （OSNR）, affected by the nonlinear interference noise together with the amplified spontaneous emission noise, are compared with three 400G systems and a standard 100 Gb/s/ch system by numerical simulations. Both single channel and multichannel cases are considered. Single-16QAM is found to have the best OSNR among those modulation formats.

Detection performance of trigger-controlled Geiger-mode avalanche photodiodes in weak optical signal detection

This Letter introduces a trigger-controlled Geiger-mode avalanche photodiode （GM-APD）. A hierarchical look- back-upon tree recurrence method is given to predict the performance of trigger-controlled GM-APDs under different trigger-count upper limits. In addition, the normalized detection probability is defined to evaluate the detection performance of trigger-controlled GM-APDs in typical weak optical signal detection （impulse noise and continuous noise situations）. Theoretical analyses show that the trigger-controlled GM-APD improves the detection performance of GM-APDs in weak optical signal detection via the optimization of the trigger-count upper limit, compared with single-trigger and multi-trigger GM-APDs.

Universal switching of plasmonic signals using optical resonator modes

We propose and investigate,both experimentally and theoretically,a novel mechanism for switching and modulating plasmonic signals based on a Fano interference process,which arises from the coupling between a narrow-band optical Fabry–Pérot cavity and a surface plasmon polariton(SPP)source.The SPP wave emitted from the cavity is actively modulated in the vicinity of the cavity resonances by altering the cavity Q-factor and/or resonant frequencies.We experimentally demonstrate dynamic SPP modulation both by mechanical control of the cavity length and all-optically by harnessing the ultrafast nonlinearity of the Au mirrors that form the cavity.An electro-optical modulation scheme is also proposed and numerically illustrated.Dynamic operation of the switch via mechanical means yields a modulation in the SPP coupling efficiency of~80%,while the all-optical control provides an ultrafast modulation with an efficiency of 30%at a rate of~0.6 THz.The experimental observations are supported by both analytical and numerical calculations of the mechanical,all-optical and electro-optical modulation methods.

Modified scaling angular spectrum method for numerical simulation in long-distance propagation

The angular method(AS)cannot be used in long-distance propagation because it produces severe numerical errors due to the sampling problem in the transfer function.Two ways can solve this problem in AS for long-distance propagation.One is zero-padding to make sure that the calculation window is wide enough,but it leads to a huge calculation burden.The other is a method called band-limited angular spectrum(BLAS),in which the transfer function is truncated and results in that the calculation accuracy decreases as the propagation distance increases.In this paper,a new method called modified scaling angular spectrum(MSAS)to solve the problem for long-distance propagation is proposed.A scaling factor is introduced in MSAS so that the sampling interval of the input plane can be adjusted arbitrarily unlike AS whose sampling interval is restricted by the detector’s pixel size.The sampling interval of the input plane is larger than the detector’s pixel size so the size of calculation window suitable for long-distance field propagation in the input plane is smaller than the size of the calculation window required by the zero-padding.Therefore,the method reduces the calculation redundancy and improves the calculation speed.The results from simulations and experiments show that MSAS has a good signal-to-noise ratio(SNR),and the calculation accuracy of MSAS is better than BLAS.

Biomedical applications of Jones-matrix tomography to polycrystalline films of biological fuids

Algorithms for reconstruction of linear and circular birefringence-dichroism of optically thin anisotropic biological layers are presented.The technique of Jones matrix tomography of poly-crystalline films of biological fuids of various human organs has been developed and experimentally tested.The coordinate distributions of phase and amplitude anisotropy of bile films and synovial fuid taken from the knee joint are determined and statistically analyzed.Criteria(statistical moments of 3rd and 4th orders)of differential diagnostics of early stages of cholelithiasis and septic arthritis of the knee joint with excellent balanced accuracy were determined.Data on the diagnostic fficiency of the Jones matrix tomography method for polyerystalline plasma(liver disease),urine(albuminuria)and cytological smears(cervical cancer)are presented.

Flexible multidimensional modulation formats based on PM-QPSK constellations for elastic optical networks

We demonstrate flexible multidimensional modulation formats, polarization multiplexed k-symbol check quad- rature phase shift keying （PM-kSC-QPSK）, based on PM-QPSK constellations for elastic optical networks. The experimental results show a significant optical signal noise ratio （OSNR） tolerance improvement for PM-2SC- QPSK and PM-4SC-QPSK over PM-QPSK in both back-to-back and 500 km transmission scenarios at the expense of spectral efficiency reduction. This flexible modulation method can be used ＇in elastic optical networks to provide a trade-off between the spectral efficiency and OSNR tolerance.

Ultrafast and real-time physical random bit extraction with all-optical quantization

Optical chaos generated by perturbing semiconductor lasers has been viewed,over recent decades,as an excellent entropy source for fast physical random bit generation(RBG)owing to its high bandwidth and large random fluctuations.However,most optical-chaos-based random bit generators perform their quantization process in the electrical domain using electrical analog-to-digital converters,so their real-time rates in a single channel are severely limited at the level of Gb/s due to the electronic bottleneck.Here,we propose and experimentally demonstrate an all-optical method for RBG where chaotic pulses are quantized into a physical random bit stream in the all-optical domain by means of a length of highly nonlinear fiber.In our proof-of-concept experiment,a 10-Gb/s random bit stream is successfully generated on-line using our method.Note that the single-channel real-time rate is limited only by the chaos bandwidth.Considering that the Kerr nonlinearity of silica fiber with an ultrafast response of few femtoseconds is exploited for composing the key part of quantizing laser chaos,this scheme thus may operate potentially at much higher real-time rates than 100 Gb/s provided that a chaotic entropy source of sufficient bandwidth is available.

Compound parabolic concentrator applied as receiving antenna in scattering optical communication

The two-dimensional（2D） compound parabolic concentrator＇s（CPC） characteristics are analyzed.It is shown that CPC＇s height is taller and its light collecting ability is stronger with the CPC＇s field of view decreasing when the bottom radius is unchanged.According to the ZEMAX analysis,CPC is good at collecting optical signal,and the antenna combining CPC with hemispherical lens can gather more optical signal than a single CPC or CPCs combined in series.The light propagation of scattering optical communication based on multiple scattering is simulated by Monte Carlo method,and the results show that using CPC as receiving antenna can strengthen communication system＇s signal collecting ability and increase its communication distance.

100 Gb/s all-optical clock recovery based on a monolithic dual-mode DBR laser

We experimentally demonstrate all-optical clock recovery for 100 Gb/s return-to-zero on-off keying signals based on a monolithic dual-mode distributed Bragg reflector （DBR） laser, which can realize both mode spacing and wavelength tuning. By using a coherent injection locking scheme, a 100 GHz optical clock can be recovered with a timing jitter of 530 fs, which is derived by an optical sampling oscilloscope from both the phase noise and the power fluctuation. Furthermore, for degraded injection signals with an optical signal-to-noise ratio as low as 4.1 dB and a 25 km long distance transmission, good-quality optical clocks are all successfully recovered.

Frequency-swept coherently detected spectral amplitude code for flexible implicit optical label switching

A new optical label switching system with coherently detected implicit spectral amplitude code （SAC） labels is proposed in this letter. The implicit SAC labels are recognized using a frequency-swept local light source oscillator. Intensity modulation payloads of 625 Mb/s and 1.25 Gb/s are considered. Label and payload bit error rate （BER） performances are assessed and compared by simulations. The results reveal that, at a BER value of 10-9, -32.4-dBm label received power can be obtained. In addition, 8.3-dB optical signal-to-noise ratio （OSNR） is obtained when carrying a payload of 625 Mb/s. The label BER value hardly reaches 10-9 if the payload bit rate is at 1.25 Gb/s; however, a high payload bit rate only has little influence on received payload quality at a BER value of 10-9. Finally, a payload of 1.25 Gb/s could obtain -28.2 dBm received power and 9.5-dB OSNR.

All-optical temporal fractional order differentiator using an in-fiber ellipsoidal air-microcavity

An all-optical temporal fractional order differentiator with ultrabroad bandwidth （-1.6 THz） and extremely simple fabrication is proposed and experimentally demonstrated based on an in-fiber ellipsoidal air-microcavity. The ellipsoidal air-microcavity is fabricated by splicing a single mode fiber （SMF） and a photonic crystal fiber （PCF） together using a simple arc-discharging technology. By changing the arc-discharging times, the propagation loss can be adjusted and then the differentiation order is tuned. A nearly Gaussian-like optical pulse with 3 dB bandwidth of 8 nm is launched into the differentiator and a 0.65 order differentiation of the input pulse is achieved with a processing error of 2.55%.