Compact optical 3R regeneration using a traveling-wave electroabsorption modulator

Abstract

We propose and demonstrate a novel reamplification, retiming, and reshaping regeneration approach that utilizes the photocurrent signal and the nonlinear electrooptical transfer function of a traveling-wave electroabsorption modulator in an electrical ring oscillator. All the required functionalities such as clock recovery, pulse generation, and nonlinear decision are implemented with the same device, leading to a very compact configuration. In addition, wavelength conversion and electrical signal monitoring can be realized at the same time. With a degraded 10-Gb/s return-to-zero input, 1.0 dB of negative power penalty and 50% timing jitter reduction are measured after regeneration.