3-MHz-30-GHz traveling-wave optical front-end receiver

Abstract

Descriptions of very-high-speed optical-communication systems requiring optical receivers operating at 20 Gbit/s have been published,1 and there is great interest in 40-100-Gbit/s systems. In this paper we present a traveling-wave front-end receiver capable of operating at up to 40 Gbit/s. The traveling-wave amplifier has a moderate noise performance at low frequencies but is superior to other front-end topologies over very wide bandwidths.2,3 However, the majority of wide-band optical front-end amplifiers have been designed for heterodyne-optical-receiver applications and not baseband applications as in this paper.