New Techniques for Transmitting Microwave Signals Over Optical Fiber ECE Research Review Day – October 9, 2009 Thomas E. Murphy Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering Institute for Research in Applied Physics
Sponsors
Participants and Collaborators Dr. Bryan Haas (Laboratory for Physical Sciences) Dr. Timothy Horton (Laboratory for Physical Sciences)
Coax vs. Fiber High loss (750 dB/km at 5 GHz) Large, heavy Bandwidth: DC–20GHz Low loss (0.2 dB/km at = 1.5 µm) Thin, lightweight Bandwidth: THz (or = 1.3–1.6 µm) (~ 5 mm diameter)
Microwave Photonics: Using optical fiber to transmit microwave signals Advantages: Negligible attenuation in fiber Lightweight Immune to EMI Disadvantages: Requires high-fidelity modulation & demodulation Total RF to RF loss can still be high
Application: Antenna Relay High-speed A/D conversion and signal processing is done remotely Problem: How to modulate and demodulate optical carrier without distortion
Conventional Microwave Optical Link
Optical Modulation
Nonlinearity and Distortion
Intermodulation Distortion 3 rd order intermodulation distortion products: (2f 2 -f 1 ) and (2f 1 -f 2 ) Doesn’t matter how close together f 1 and f 2 are
What About Phase Modulation?
TE and TM experience different degrees of phase modulation A Linearized Phase Modulator
Linearization Condition Third order nonlinearity can be cancelled, provided we choose and to satisfy: = ratio of TE/TM phase modulation
Linearized Phase Modulator For LiNbO 3, TE and TM modes experience different phase mod. r 33 = 31 pm/V r 13 = 10 pm/V Similar ratio is seen in EO polymers
Lithium Niobate Phase Modulator Experiment
Reduced Distortion Third order nonlinearity can be cancelled, provided we choose and to satisfy: = ratio of TE/TM phase modulation
Summary Modulation nonlinearity can introduce distortion in microwave photonic transmission systems New technique for linearization by using both polarization states in a phase modulator Future Integrated polymer phase modulators, with built-in antenna Applications in next-generation picocell wireless networks