Abstract

Code division is a suitable multiple-access technique for fiber- optics local-area networks (LANs) having bursty traffic characteristics. Unlike with time-division multiple access (TDMA), no synchronization between the transmitting users is necessary, nor is the reservation of time slots for each subscriber. Optical encoders and decoders made of delay lines have been proposed’ for overcoming the speed limit of optical-to-electrical (O/E) and electrical-to-optical (E/O) conversions. Optical processors made of delay lines are usually considered as being nonconherent, and the design of unipolar (0, 1) codes, called prime codes or optical orthogonal codes (OOC), has been necessary.- This is also true when the optical sources used have a short coherence time. However, unipolar codes are less efficient than bipolar codes, such as Gold codes or Kasami sequences, for a given code length, in terms of number of simultaneous users they can support and in terms of number of possible subscribers.

© 1994 Optical Society of America