Abstract

The realisation of the 'information superhighway' or, more accurately, a broadband fibre optic telecommunications network, will require a huge increase in the data rates supported by the worlds existing fibre optic networks. As most installed terrestrial systems currently use fibre with a dispersion minimum at 1.3 microns it is clear that a practical 1.3 micron fibre amplifier could play a significant role in the evolution of such systems^[1]. The existence of a practical 1.3 micron amplifier would allow a simple means by which the existing optical fibre base could evolve to the Gigabit data rates soon to be required. In this context, simple refers to the fact that if amplification is available to overcome the higher transmission loss of the 'second window', then the naturally low dispersion at this wavelength will allow the use of directly modulated commercial laser sources and low-cost PIN FET receivers enabling a straightforward and thereby reliable means of network upgrade.

© 1994 Optical Society of America