10 Gb/s 16-quadrature amplitude modulation signal
delivery over a wireless fiber system by using a directly
modulated laser for electrical/optical conversion
Lun Zhao (赵 伦) and Jianguo Yu (余建国)*
School of Electronic Engineering, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing 100876, China
*Corresponding author: yujg@bupt.edu.cn
Received November 21, 2014; accepted April 8, 2015; posted online May 4, 2015
We propose and experimentally demonstrate a novel scheme to realize electrical/optical (E/O) conversion on the
receiver side of a wireless fiber integration system at the W band. At the receiver, a directly modulated laser
(DML) is used to realize E/O conversion. The received 85 GHz wireless millimeter-wave (mm-wave) signal is first
down-converted into a 10 GHz electrical intermediate-frequency (IF) signal to overcome the insufficient band-
width of the subsequent DML. Then, two cascaded electrical amplifiers (EAs) are employed to boost the elec-
trical IF signal before it is used to drive a DML. By using this scheme, we transmit a 10 Gb/s 16 quadrature
amplitude modulation (16QAM) signal over a 10 m wireless link, and then deliver it over a 2 km single-mode
fiber-28 (SMF-28) wire link with a bit error ratio (BER) that is less than the hard-decision forward error
correction threshold of 3.8 × 10
−3
. Our experimental results show that the DML is good device to be used
for the E/O conversion of a 16QAM signal.
OCIS codes: 060.0060, 060.2840, 060.5625, 060.3510.
doi: 10.3788/COL201513.060601.
It is known to us that fourth-generation (4G) mobile com-
munications can provide a data rate ranging from 100 to
150 Mb/s. Furthermore, fifth-genera tion (5G) mobile
communications, which are currently being researc hed,
will support multi-gigabit or tens-of-gigabit per second
data transmission with huge bandwidth and massive
multiple-input and multiple-output (MIMO) technology.
This means that the future mobile or wireless communi-
cations can provide the same capacity as a baseband
optical communications system. This will provide a cost-
effective solution for a future wireless-fiber seamless inte-
gration network and future data interconnects. Lately, the
wireless-fiber seamless integration system based on an
optical multilevel, modulated, and heterodyne-detected
technique has attracted the interest of more and more peo-
ple, as it can provide high-speed mobile backhaul between
wireless macro stations, as well as emergency services
when la rge-capacity, long-distance optical fibers are cut
during natural disasters, such as tsunamis and earth-
quakes. High-speed, seamlessly integra ted wirele ss-fiber
transmissions such as the 100 G and 400 G integration sys-
tems have been intensively studied in the research commu-
nity by adopting the technologies of polarization division
multiplexing, multilevel quadrature amplitude/phase
modulation, photonic millimeter-wave (mm-wave) gener-
ation, MIMO, and advanced digital signal processing
(DSP) algorithms
[1–7]
. However, in the previous cases
[1–7]
,
the generated multilevel modulated wireless mm-wave
signal is electronically demodulated and has a limited ra-
dio-frequency (RF) transmission distanc e due to the high
mm-wave carrier frequency. In addition, the demodula-
tion of a wireless mm-wave signal in the electrical domain
will become more complicated with the increase in the bit
rate and mm-wave carrier frequency. Sambaraju et al.
[8]
proposed a RF-transparent wireless-fiber integration sys-
tem in which the wireless mm-wave signal is up-converted
into the optical domain. Then, the converted optical
signal can be directly transmitted in the fiber and demodu-
lated in the optical domain by coherent detection. Ad-
vanced DSP algorithms could be adopted to remove the
wired and wireless transmission impairments, including
chromatic dispersion (CD), polarization mode dispersion,
nonlinearity, the wireless multi-path effect, component
filtering, and so on
[1]
.
As noted above, a wireless optical fiber can be used to
seamlessly integrate an optical/wireless system to meet
the bandwidth requirement. We can increase the spectrum
efficiency by using a high-order modulation format,
such as 16-quadrature amplitude modulation (16QAM).
People have demonstrated that the intensity or the phase
modulator can be used for realizing electrical/optical
(E/O) conversion at the receiver side for a wireless-fiber
connection
[9–12]
. As far as we know, reducing both the size
and cost are important in a seamlessly integrated wireless
optical fiber system. A directly modulated laser (DML)
has a small size, low cost, and a small driving voltage
[13]
.
It is necessary for us to investigate whether an integrated
wireless-fiber system can realize E/O conversion by a
DML on the receiver side. In this Letter, we propose a
wireless-fiber integration system in which the E/O conver-
sion is based on the DML. We demonstrate that a DML
can be used for E/O conversion on the receiver side. Up to
a 10 Gb/s 16QAM signal can be delivered over a 10 m
wireless link at 85 GHz. Then, the DML is used for
xE/O conversion. A photo-detector (PD) is used for O/E
conversion after a 2 km single-mode fiber-28 (SMF-28)
COL 13(6), 060601(2015) CHINESE OPTICS LETTERS June 10, 2015
1671-7694/2015/060601(4) 060601-1 © 2015 Chinese Optics Letters