PMD emulation, measurement and compensation device

• US 6,996,297 B2
• Filed: 09/18/2001
• Issued: 02/07/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 10/09/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Thorlabs GmbH (Fortive Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Thorlabs GmbH (Fortive Corp.)
• Inventors: Krause, Egbert, Bandemer, Adalbert
• Primary Examiner(s): Palmer, Phan T. H.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Doan, Jennifer
• Application Number:
  US10/398,273
• Publication Number:
  US 20040028309A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,603 Days
• Field of Search: 385/11, 385/24, 385/27, 385/123
• US Class Current: 385/11
• CPC Class Codes: G01M 11/336 by measuring polarization mode dispersion [PMD]
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 10/2569 due to polarisation mode dispersion [PMD]

Abstract

A PMD emulation, measurement and compensation device is based upon an emulation device having a piece of fiber having a fixed differential group delay (DGD) and another short piece of fiber (or double refracting crystal) having a variable differential group delay (T-DGD). The two pieces of fiber are coupled with a non-zero torsional angle between their respective double refractive axes, preferably 45°. A fiber squeezer/stretcher is used to provide the variable DGD for the short piece of fiber. Various serial couplings of DGD and T-DGD fiber may be added to provide greater control and accuracy, with the torsional angles preferably alternating. Such an emulation device may be incorporated into a measurement device to measure the PMD-related distortion of an optical signal. Further the measurement device may be used in a PMD compensator where an emulation device in series with the optical signal path is controlled until the measured PMD in the PMD-related distorted optical signal is minimized.

Claims

1. An emulation device for emulating a polarization mode dispersion (PMD) of an optical transmission system comprising

an emulator input for an optical signal;

at least one controllable birefringent polarization transformation element having a transformation element input and a transformation element output, which is designed for the polarization transformation of the optical signal;

at least one birefringent DGD element having a DGD input and a DGD output, the DGD element comprising a differential group delay time DGD between two mutually orthogonally polarized propagation modes of the DGD element; and

an emulator output for a PMD-modified optical output signal;

said polarization transformation element and DGD element being disposed in relation to each other in an optical signal path between the emulator input and the emulator output such that birefringent axes at the transformation element output are twisted by a torsional angle which is different from zero degrees in relation to the birefringent axes at the DGD input.

2. The emulation device according to claim 1, the polarization transformation element further comprising at least one birefringent variable DGD with an adjustable differential group time DGD_var that is adjustable for the transformation of the polarization.

3. The emulation device according to claim 2, wherein a quotient DGD_var/DGD is smaller than 0.5 and preferably smaller than 0.1.

4. The emulation device according to claim 2, the polarization transformation element further comprising a plurality of birefringent variable DGD elements arranged one after the other in the signal path.

5. The emulation device according to claim 4, wherein neighboring variable DGD elements of the plurality of variable DGD elements are arranged such that their respective birefringent axes are twisted relative to each other by a torsional angle which is different from zero degrees.

6. The emulation device according to claim 1 wherein the torsional angle is 30 degrees to 60 degrees and preferably about 45 degrees.

7. The emulation device according to claim 1, the DGD element further comprising at least one polarization-maintaining optical fiber and/or at least one birefringent crystal;

and the polarization transformation element further comprising at least one polarization-maintaining optical fiber, at least one birefringent crystal and/or at least one short single-mode optical fiber.

8. The emulation device according to claim 7, the polarization transformation element further comprising at least one mechanical adjustment element, which exerts a mechanical effect to modify DGD_var and preferably comprises a fiber squeezer and/or stretcher.

9. The emulation device according to claim 8, the fiber squeezer or stretcher further comprising a piezo electric element which, for a damping of transversal oscillations, is guided in a bearing housing on the side by elastic oscillation attenuators.

10. The emulation device according to claim 8, the fiber squeezer or stretcher further comprising a piezo electric element which is positioned in such a way via a thermally compensating compensation element on a bearing housing that the resulting thermal expansion coefficient of the arrangement of the piezo electric element and the compensation element is equal to the thermal expansion coefficient of the bearing housing.

11. The emulation device according to claim 8, the fiber squeezer further comprising a squeezing stamp and a metal foil being arranged between the fiber to be squeezed and the squeezing stamp such that a twisting of the fiber is avoided when the squeezing stamp slips.

12. The emulation device according to claim 7, wherein the polarization-maintaining optical fiber of the polarization element at the transformation element output is spliced with the polarization-maintaining optical fiber of the DGD element at the DGD input so that the torsional angle between the birefringent axes at the transformation element output relative to those at the DGD input is not equal to 0 degrees.

13. The emulation device according to claim 1, further comprising a second birefringent DGD element being arranged between the emulator input and the polarization transformation element.

14. The emulation device according to claim 13, further comprising a second polarization transformation element being arranged between the emulator input and the second DGD element.

15. The emulation device according to claim 1, further comprising a plurality of polarization transformation elements and DGD elements being arranged between the emulator input and the emulator output in an alternating sequence, with at least on of the polarization transformation elements consisting of a variable DGD element or, as a maximum, two variable DGD elements with a twisted orientation relative to each other.

16. The emulation device according to claim 15, wherein the polarization transformation element of the emulator input side is comprised of several, particularly a maximum of four variable DGD elements twisted relative to each other, and the remaining elements being comprised of a variable DGD element or at least two variable DGD elements twisted relative to each other.

17. A compensation device for compensating polarization mode dispersion (PMD)-related distortions in an optical transmission system, comprising

the emulation device according to any one of the above claims, the emulator input being designed to input a PMD-distorted optical signal and the emulator output being designed to output an optical signal;

a measurement device for measuring the PMD-related distortion of the optical

signal and outputting a measurement output signal; and

a control device, which sees the measurement output signal and which controls the emulation device in such a way that the latter minimizes, and preferably fully compensates, the PMD-related distortion.

26. The emulation device according to claim 5, wherein the torsional angle is 30 degrees to 60 degrees and preferably about 45 degrees.

18. A measurement device for measuring a polarization mode dispersion (PMD)-related distortion of an optical signal, comprising

a measurement input for the optical signal;

at least one polarizer;

at least one polarization transformation element, which is designed for the polarization transformation of the optical signal and in which a signal path of the optical signal is arranged between the measurement input and the polarizer;

at least one photo detector for dectecting an intensity P_pol of the optical signal, which is arranged in the signal path of the optical signal behind the polarizer; and

a control and output device connected to the polarization transformation element and the photo detector, which controls the polarization transformation element such that the intensity P_pol is either at a minimum or maximum level and generates a measurement output signal, which corresponds to the minimum or maximum intensity P_pol,min or P_pol,max, respectively, as a measure of the PMD distortion of the optical signal.

19. A measurement device according to claim 18, further comprising a second photo detector being provided to detect a total intensity P_tot of the optical signal in front of the polarization transformation element, and the control and output device outputting a measurement output signal corresponding to the normalized minimum or maximum intensity P_pol,min/ P_tot or P_pol,max/ P_tot, respectively.

20. A measurement device according to claim 18, the polarization transformation element further comprising at least one variable DGD element with an adjustable differential group delay time DGD_var for the transformation of the polarization.

21. A measurement device according to claim 20, the polarization transformation element further comprising two variable DGD elements which are arranged such that their respective birefringent axes are twisted relative to each other by a torsional angle that is different from zero degrees.

22. A measurement device according to claim 20, each of the variable DGD elements further comprising a polarization-maintaining optical fiber and a mechanical adjustment element which exerts a mechanical effect on the optical fiber to change DGD_var and preferably a fiber squeezer and/or stretcher.

23. A compensation device for compensating polarization mode dispersion (PMD)-related distortions in an optical transmission system comprising

an emulation device with an emulator input to input a PMD-distorted optical signal and an emulator output to output an optical output signal, the measurement device according to any one of the claims 19-22 to measure the PMD-related distortion of the optical signal and to output a corresponding measurement output signal;

and

a control device, which sees the measurement output signal and which controls the emulation device in such a way that the latter minimizes, and preferably fully compensates, the PMD-related distortion.

24. Compensation device for compensating polarization mode dispersion (PMD)-related distortions in an optical transmission system, comprising:

an emulation device with an emulator input to input a PMD-distorted optical signal and an emulator output to output an optical output signal, the emulation device comprising a plurality of controllable polarization transformation elements and a plurality of DGD elements;

a measurement device for measuring the PDM-related distortion of the optical signal and outputting a measurement output signal; and

a control device, which sees the measurement output signal and which controls the emulation device in such a way that the latter minimizes, and preferably fully compensates, the PMD-related distortion, the control device being designed to output an adjustment signal to the polarization transformation elements, which is superimposed with a periodic modulation signal, to detect, with a correct intensity and phase, corresponding modulation components in the measurement output signal, and to produce a new adjustment signal as a function of the modulation components detected.

25. The compensation device according to claim 24, wherein modulation frequencies of the modulation signals being different for each polarization transformation element and preferably lying in a frequency range of 20 kHz to 500 kHz, especially preferred, 40 kHz to 150 kHz.