System assessment of the RACE 1010 coherent multichannel demonstrator

摘要

The RACE 1010 Coherent Multichannel (CMC) Subscriber System Demonstrator, one of the major demonstrators of RACE phase 1, explored the application of CMC techniques to broadband signal distribution in the subscriber access regime. Within this paper, the principal experiments and results of the recently completed assessment programme are reported. Transmitter, receiver and systems performance are presented, as well as the compatibility of CMC with optical amplification and directdetection subscriber services. Overall, the assessment programme has shown that CMC technology, far from being a laboratory curiosity, can now be engineered to operate in a realistic environment and is of sufficient maturity to enable field trials and commercial deployment.