Clock recovering characteristics of adaptive finite-impulse-response filters in digital coherent optical receivers.

We analyze the clock-recovery process based on adaptive finite-impulse-response (FIR) filtering in digital coherent optical receivers. When the clock frequency is synchronized between the transmitter and the receiver, only five taps in half-symbol-spaced FIR filters can adjust the sampling phase of analog-to-digital conversion optimally, enabling bit-error rate performance independent of the initial sampling phase. Even if the clock frequency is not synchronized between them, the clock-frequency misalignment can be adjusted within an appropriate block interval; thus, we can achieve an asynchronous clock mode of operation of digital coherent receivers with block processing of the symbol sequence.