All-optical frequency downconversion technique utilizing a four-wave mixing effect in a single semiconductor optical amplifier for wavelength division multiplexing radio-over-fiber applications.

An all-optical frequency downconversion utilizing a four-wave mixing effect in a single semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) was experimentally demonstrated for wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) radio-over-fiber (RoF) applications. Two WDM optical radio frequency (RF) signals having 155 Mbps differential phase shift keying (DPSK) data at 28.5 GHz were simultaneously down-converted to two WDM optical intermediate frequency (IF) signals having an IF frequency of 4.5 GHz by mixing with an optical local oscillator (LO) signal having a LO frequency of 24 GHz in the SOA. The bit-error-rate (BER) performance of the RoF up-links with different optical fiber lengths employing all-optical frequency downconversion was investigated. The receiver sensitivity of the RoF up-link with a 6 km single mode fiber and an optical IF signal in an optical double-sideband format was approximately -8.5 dBm and the power penalty for simultaneous frequency downconversion was approximately 0.63 dB. The BER performance showed a strong dependence on the fiber length due to the fiber dispersion. The receiver sensitivity of the RoF up-link with the optical IF signal in the optical single-sideband format was reduced to approximately -17.4 dBm and showed negligible dependence on the fiber length.