Fast liquid crystal end-less polarisation controller for first order PMD compensation

摘要

We present the principle of a fast liquid crystal end-less polarisation controller fur fust order polarisation mode dispersion compensation (PMD). We demonstrate how this device can be used as a variable and rotatable wave-plate and the resulting advantages to optimize the complexity of polarisation tracking algorithms. We give some experimental results obtained with an electro-clinic homeotropically aligned liquid crystal cell used as a variable and rotatable wave-plate. We discuss then the performance and the way to improve the device characteristics in order to meet the current operational PMD compensation requirements.