SOA-aided photonic signal generation for hybrid fibre and FSO 5G transmission links

摘要

A 5 Gb/s 32-QAM data transmission over a hybrid standard single-mode fibre (SSMF) and free-space optics (FSO) link has been experimentally demonstrated in the 42-90 GHz range for 5G networks deployment. Four-wave mixing (FWM) nonlinear effect in a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) experienced by a carrier suppressed double sideband modulated signal has been employed to photonically generate millimetre wave (mmW) signals with reduced electronics bandwidth. Both simulation and experimental results have been shown to describe the error vector magnitude (EVM) performance of the system. Large operation bandwidth is shown in our experimental setup, where measured penalties for 42 and 66 GHz are below 1 dB whereas 90 GHz leads to 3 dB penalty at 12 % EVM threshold. Sensitivity has also been estimated for optical back-to-back (OB2B), after SSMF and hybrid link transmissions for different mmW frequencies.