Abstract

The Erbium doped fiber amplifier (EDFA) is one of the key components for the tremendous, fast pace progress in optical telecommunication. Do to its high efficiency, large output power, low noise figure, and compactness, it found its way into diverse applications at different locations in the optical network. In order to exploit the EDFA capabilities to a maximum, theoretical models were soon developed for further optimization of the EDFA's. Although these different models proved as a valuable tool for the proper tuning of parameters like the Erbium ion density and confinement in the active fiber, they are typically not capable of predicting important parameters like the distributed gain or optimum fiber length to better than 10-15% for a specific experimental configuration. A direct measurement of the gain distribution is therefore preferred.

© 2000 IEEE