High-repetition-rate pulsed-pump fiber OPA for amplification of communication signals

Abstract

The use of a high-repetition-rate pulsed-pumped fiber optical parametric amplifier (OPA), followed by a narrow optical filter for transparent signal amplification, was proposed. Theory and simulations predict larger gain and gain bandwidth compared to a continuous-wave pump with the same average power. Experimentally, when using a pump with 0.63 W of average power in a 500-m-long highly nonlinear fiber, the gain increased from 19.7 to 29.2 dB, and the bandwidth increased when a CW pump was changed to one that is modulated by a 20-GHz cosine-squared function. Clear eye openings were demonstrated for the amplification of a 10-Gb/s NRZ signal, with a power penalty of 1.5 dB