Optical amplifiers and their applications

In the past few years research into all-optical amplification has been intensified. The performance expectations of both semiconductor and fibre amplifiers are becoming better understood and the number of possible applications is rapidly increasing. The particular attraction of linear optical amplifiers is that in most cases they offer very wide bandwidths, up to 5 THz, which is attractive for many of the wideband signalling schemes proposed for future networks. Thus it is hoped that optical amplifiers will allow the direct amplification of wavelength- and frequency-division multiplexing and other wideband schemes such as subcarrier modulation. There is still considerable work to be done, however, in evaluating the amplifier performance in certain cases, for example in the presence of a large number of closely spaced channels. This paper discusses the characteristics of semiconductor and fibre amplifiers and considers their performance expectations in a number of applications relating to wideband networks.

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