EE 230: Optical Fiber Communication

Description
Components and system design for optical fiber communication.
Intended audience: Graduate or advanced undergraduate students.
Prerequisite: Instructor permission
Textbook: K. Iizuka, Elements of Photonics, Volume II, Wiley (2002).
Time: T/Th 10:00-11:45 am
Location: Crown 105
Course Instructor: Chris Moylan
223 Jack Baskin Engineering Building

Phone: (831) 459-5453, (650) 723-9518

E-mail: cmoylan@soe.ucsc.edu
Office hours: Th 2-4p

From the movie

Warriors of the Net

Course Content
Fibers:
Step-index fibers, graded-index fibers.
Fiber modes, single-mode fibers, multimode fibers.
Dispersion, mode coupling, and loss mechanics.
Glass materials, fiber fabrication, and characterization
techniques.

Sources and Transmitters:

Light-emission processes in semiconductors.
Light-emitting diodes (LEDs).
Semiconductor lasers, (laser diodes: LDs).
Modulation response.
Source-fiber coupling.

(Image courtesy of Artem Visual Effects.)

Course Content: continued

Detectors and Receivers:
Photodetectors, receivers.
Receiver noise and sensitivity.
Optical Amplifiers
Erbium doped fiber amplifiers
Semiconductor optical amplifiers
Raman amplification
Systems:
System design: power budget and
rise-time budget.
Single-Wavelength Fiber-Optic
Networks (FDDI, SONET)
Wavelength-Division Multiplexing
(WDM)

(Image courtesy of C.O.R.E. Digital Picture.)

A Short History of Optical Telecommunications

Circa2500B.C.Earliestknownglass
Romantimesglassdrawnintofibers
VeniceDecorativeFlowersmadeofglassfibers
1609Galileousesopticaltelescope
1626Snellformulateslawofrefraction
1668Newtoninventsreflectiontelescope
1840SamuelMorseInventsTelegraph
1841DanielColladonLightguidingdemonstrated
inwaterjet
1870Tyndallobserveslightguidinginathinwaterjet
1873Maxwellelectromagneticwaves
1876ElishaGrayandAlexanderBellInventTelephone
1877FirstTelephoneExchange
1880BellinventsPhotophone
1888HertzConfirmsEMwavesandrelationtolight
18801920Glassrodsusedforillumination
1897Rayleighanalyzeswaveguide
1899MarconiRadioCommunication
1902Marconiinventionofradiodetector
19101940VacuumTubesinventedanddeveloped
1930Lambexperimentswithsilicafiber
1931OwensFiberglass
19361940Communicationusingawaveguide

1876-Alexander Graham Bell

1970 I. Hayashi
Semiconductor Laser

1876 First commercial Telephone

A Short History- Continued

1951Heel,Hopkins,Kapanyimagetransmissionusingfiber
bundles
1957FirstEndoscopeusedinpatient
1958Goubauet.al.Experimentswiththelensguide
195859Kapanycreatesopticalfiberwithcladding
1960TedMaimandemonstratesfirstlaserinRuby
1960Javanet.al.inventsHeNelaser
19624Groupssimultaneouslymakefirstsemiconductor
lasers
196166Kao,Snitzeretalconceiveoflowlosssinglemode
fibercommunicationsanddeveloptheory
1970Firstroomtemp.CWsemiconductorlaserHayashi&
Panish
April1977Firstfiberlinkwithlivetelephonetraffic
GTELongBeach6Mb/s
May1977FirstBellsystem45mb/slinks
GaAslasers850nmMultimode2dB/kmloss
Early1980sInGaAsP1.3mLasers
0.5dB/km,lowerdispersionSinglemode
Late1980sSinglemodetransmissionat1.55m0.2
dB/km
1989Erbiumdopedfiberamplifier
1Q19968ChannelWDM
4thQ199616ChannelWDM
1Q199840ChannelWDM

Bells Photophone
1880 - Photophone Receiver

1880 - Photophone
Transmitter

The ordinary manwill find a little difficulty in comprehending how sunbeams are to be used. Does Prof. Bell intend to
connect Boston and Cambridgewith a line of sunbeams hung on telegraph posts, and, if so, what diameter are the
sunbeams to be?will it be necessary to insulate them against the weather?until (the public) sees a man going
through the streets with a coil of No. 12 sunbeams on his shoulder, and suspending them from pole to pole, there will be a
general feeling that there is something about Prof. Bells photophone which places a tremendous strain on human credulity.
New York Times Editorial, 30 August 1880

Increase in Bitrate-Distance product

Agrawal-Fiber Optic Communications

Progress In Lightwave
Communication Technology

Growth of the Internet

Demand Driver for High Bandwidth Communications

The Internet

From: www.caida.org

Traffic Growth and Composition

Approaches to Optical Communication

Lightwave Application Areas

Laser
Diode

Board-to-Board

Optical

Rack -To-Rack
Data

N:1
Mux

D-F/F
Retiming

Laser
Driver

NE7809

p8986

Clock
NE7809

Transmitter
Photo
Detector

NE7809

Chip-to-Chip

Optical
Preamp

PreampMain
Amp

1:N
D-F/F
Decision DeMux

Clock
Recovery

Optical interconnects
Chip to Chip (Unlikely in near future)
Board to Board (>1foot eg. CPU-Memory)
Subsystem-Subsystem (Optics used Low Speed)

Data

Clock

Receiver

Telecommunications
Long Haul (Small Market-High Performance)
LANs (Large Market Lower Performance)

High-Speed Analog (CATV-Remote Satellite)

Optical Fiber System

Why fiber?

Palais-Fiber Optic Communications

Optical Fiber Attenuation and Fiber Amplifier Gain

Image Transmission by Fiber Bundle

Optics-Hecht & Zajac Photo by American Cytoscope Makers Inc.

Installed Fiber in US

Global Undersea Fiber systems

UUNET

Example Metro network

Palo Alto Fiber Optic Backbone

Route Map