Abstract

It is anticipated that more than one optical amplifier will be inserted between transmitters and receivers in distribution networks as well as in long haul links for which the transmission is limited by loss and not by dispersion. Further, if densely spaced multichannel systems are implemented for effective utilization of the transmission medium, optical amplifiers may introduce intermodulation distortion (IMD) and crosstalk between the channels [1]-[3], [5], and [7]. In this paper we present an experimental and theoretical analysis of carrier induced nonlinearities in cascaded laser amplifiers. Previously, an analysis of noise accumulation in cascaded amplifiers was presented [4].

© 1990 Optical Society of America