Abstract

This paper is dealing with the non-linear distortion of different optical modulators including directly modulated laser diode (LD), Mach-Zehnder modulator (MZM) and reflective semi-conductor optical amplifier (RSOA), which are candidates of optical device used to make colorless ONUs. To analyze the performance of different optical modulators a unified mathematic model is developed in which the optical OFDM signal output from an optical modulator is expressed as a power series including 1^-st order and higher order terms. Based on this statistical model, the performance of the modulators are computed and compared. The effect of third order distortion in modulating signal on error vector magnitude (EVM) is particularly evaluated for optimizing the fiber transmission link.

© 2011 Optical Society of America