All-optical buffering for DPSK packets

Advanced modulation formats, such as DPSK, DQPSK, QAM, have become the mainstream technologies in the optical network over 40Gb/s, the DPSK format is the fundamental of all advanced modulation formats. Optical buffers, as a key element for temporarily storing packets in order to synchronization or contention resolution in optical nodes, must be adapted to this new requirement. Different from other current buffers to store the NRZ or RZ format, an all-optical buffer of storing DPSK packets based on nonlinear polarization rotation in SOA is proposed and demonstrated. In this buffer, a section of PMF is used as fiber delay line to maintain the polarization states unchanged, the driver current of SOA is optimized, and no amplifier is required in the fiber loop. A packet delay resolution of 400ns is obtained and storage for tens rounds is demonstrated without significant signal degradation. Using proposed the new tunable DPSK demodulator, bit error rate has been measured after buffering for tens rounds for 10Gb/s data payload. Configurations for First-in First-out (FIFO) buffer or First-in Last-out (FILO) buffer are proposed based on this buffer. The buffer is easy control and suitable for integration. The terminal contention caused by different clients can be mitigated by managing packets delays in future all-optical network, such as optical packet switching network and WDM switching network.