68.3 km transmission with 1.37 Tbit km/s capacity using wavelength division multiplexing of ten single-frequency lasers at 1.5 μm

Abstract

We describe the first single-fibre lightwave transmission system with more than 1 Tbit km/s capacity. The ultrahigh-capacity transmission over 68.3 km of low-loss single-mode fibre was achieved by closely spaced wavelength division multiplexing of ten distributed feedback lasers. The lasers operated around 1.5 μm wavelength and the multiplexer channel spacing was 1.35 nm. Each laser/channel was modulated at 2 Gbit/s giving a total transmission capacity of 1.366 Tbit km/s.