Abstract

The need for ever increasing data rates in flexible optical networks, together with limited bandwidth resources, have recently given rise to the notion of flexible and adaptive optical modulation formats [1]. Depending on the optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR), the complexity of the modulation format can be increased or reduced, resulting in a varying number of transported bits per symbol. In this paper we will investigate optimum modulation constellations for formats of various numbers of levels.

© 2011 Optical Society of America