The combination of forward error correction (FEC) and interleaving can be used to improve free-space optical communication systems. Recent research has optimised the codeword length and interleaving depth under the assumption of a fixed buffering size; however, how the buffering size influences the system performance remains unsolved. This study models the system performance as a function of buffering size and FEC recovery threshold, which allows system designers to determine optimum parameters in consideration of the overhead. The modelling is based on statistics of temporal features of correct data reception and burst error length through the measurement of the channel good time and outage time. The experimental results show good coherence with the theoretical values. This method can also be applied in other channels if a continuous-time-Markov-chain model of the channel can be derived.

We study the properties of a soliton crystal, a bound state of several optical pulses that propagate with a fixed temporal separation through the optical fibres of the proposed approach for generation of optical frequency combs (OFC) for astronomical spectrograph calibration. This approach - also being suitable for subpicosecond pulse generation for other applications - consists of a conventional single-mode fibre and a suitably pumped Erbium-doped fibre. Two continuous-wave lasers are used as light source. The soliton crystal arises out of the initial deeply modulated laser field at low input powers; for higher input powers, it dissolves into free solitons. We study the soliton crystal build-up in the first fibre stage with respect to different fibre parameters (group-velocity dispersion, nonlinearity, and optical losses) and to the light source characteristics (laser frequency separation and intensity difference). We show that the soliton crystal can be described by two quantities, its fundamental frequency and the laser power-threshold at which the crystal dissolves into free solitons. The soliton crystal exhibits features of a linear and nonlinear optical pattern at the same time and is insensitive to the initial laser power fluctuations. We perform our studies using the numerical technique called Soliton Radiation Beat Analysis.

We present experimental results for wavelength-division multiplexed (WDM) transmission performance using unbalanced proportions of 1s and 0s in pseudo-random bit sequence (PRBS) data. This investigation simulates the effect of local, in time, data unbalancing which occurs in some coding systems such as forward error correction when extra bits are added to the WDM data stream. We show that such local unbalancing, which would practically give a time-dependent error-rate, can be employed to improve the legacy long-haul WDM system performance if the system is allowed to operate in the nonlinear power region. We use a recirculating loop to simulate a long-haul fibre system.

We have revised soliton transmission in the new context of coherent optical detection optimizing and comparing digital backward propagation and in-line optical filtering as a means to suppress soliton timing and phase jitter. We find that in-line optical filtering allows one to improve the reach of the soliton system by up to the factor of two. We compared jitter suppression for transmission links using different types of fiber. We showed that with launch power growth jitter suppression is less efficient. However, our results show that nonlinear propagation can lead to enhanced performance of the fiber network systems.

Machine to machine (M2M) communication has raised significant interests. However, due to the massive number of machine type communication (MTC) devices that are anticipated to communicate using cellular networks, there is a major problem on efficient accommodation of the heavy Random Access (RA) loads from the MTC devices. Use of small cells has been specified to provide network densification by 3GPP. In this paper we investigate the use of small cells to support RA and the allocation of Zadoff-Chu sequences to the small cells, which are used to generate preambles for the RA procedure. Small cells can be deployed on demand to handle mainly RA loads from MTC devices, which may generate much less data traffic compared to human devices. It is demonstrated that, with small cell support, more random channel access opportunities are provided and this can effectively support a massive number of machine devices. Using both simulations and analytical model the proposed implementation is evaluated and compared to two existing random access schemes without small cell support (the basic random access scheme and the access class barring (ACB) scheme). It is observed that the capacity of the networks in terms of the number of supported machine devices with small cell support can be increased significantly. The proposed implementation shows large potential to handle random channel access for massive machine devices.

WDM signal degradation from pump phase-modulation in a one-pump 20dB net-gain fibre optical parametric amplifier is experimentally and numerically characterised for the first time using 10×59Gb/s QPSK signals.

We propose a fibre-based approach for generation of optical frequency combs (OFCs) with the aim of calibration of astronomical spectrographs in the low and medium-resolution range. This approach includes two steps: in the first step, an appropriate state of optical pulses is generated and subsequently moulded in the second step delivering the desired OFC. More precisely, the first step is realised by injection of two continuous-wave (CW) lasers into a conventional single-mode fibre, whereas the second step generates a broad OFC by using the optical solitons generated in step one as initial condition. We investigate the conversion of a bichromatic input wave produced by two initial CW lasers into a train of optical solitons, which happens in the fibre used as step one. Especially, we are interested in the soliton content of the pulses created in this fibre. For that, we study different initial conditions (a single cosine-hump, an Akhmediev breather, and a deeply modulated bichromatic wave) by means of soliton radiation beat analysis and compare the results to draw conclusion about the soliton content of the state generated in the first step. In case of a deeply modulated bichromatic wave, we observed the formation of a collective soliton crystal for low input powers and the appearance of separated solitons for high input powers. An intermediate state showing the features of both, the soliton crystal and the separated solitons, turned out to be most suitable for the generation of OFC for the purpose of calibration of astronomical spectrographs.

The optical conversion bandwidth for an all-optical modulation format converter, based on a semiconductor laser amplifier in a nonlinear optical loop mirror (SOA-NOLM), is investigated. 4×10Gbit/s channels are all-optically converted between both non-return-to-zero (NRZ) and return-to-zero (RZ) format to carrier-suppressed return-to-zero (CSRZ). WDM transmission of the converted signals over a 194km fibre span is then demonstrated. The receiver sensitivity for the converted four wavelengths is measured and compared after transmission.

The innovation of optical frequency combs (OFCs) generated in passive mode-locked lasers has provided astronomy with unprecedented accuracy for wavelength calibration in high-resolution spectroscopy in research areas such as the discovery of exoplanets or the measurement of fundamental constants. The unique properties of OCFs, namely a highly dense spectrum of uniformly spaced emission lines of nearly equal intensity over the nominal wavelength range, is not only beneficial for high-resolution spectroscopy. Also in the low-to medium-resolution domain, the OFCs hold the promise to revolutionise the calibration techniques. Here, we present a novel method for generation of OFCs. As opposed to the mode-locked laser-based approach that can be complex, costly, and difficult to stabilise, we propose an all optical fibre-based system that is simple, compact, stable, and low-cost. Our system consists of three optical fibres where the first one is a conventional single-mode fibre, the second one is an erbium-doped fibre and the third one is a highly nonlinear low-dispersion fibre. The system is pumped by two equally intense continuous-wave (CW) lasers. To be able to control the quality and the bandwidth of the OFCs, it is crucial to understand how optical solitons arise out of the initial modulated CW field in the first fibre. Here, we numerically investigate the pulse evolution in the first fibre using the technique of the solitons radiation beat analysis. Having applied this technique, we realised that formation of higher-order solitons is supported in the low-energy region, whereas, in the high-energy region, Kuznetsov-Ma solitons appear.

We have revisited soliton transmission in the new context of coherent optical detection optimizing and comparing digital backward propagation and in-line optical filtering as a means to suppress soliton timing and phase jitter. We find that in-line optical filtering allows one to improve the reach of the soliton system by up to the factor of 2. Our results show that nonlinear propagation can lead to performance beyond the nonlinear Shannon limit.

We present experimental results for the effect of an increased supervisory signal power in a high-loss loopback supervisory system in an optically amplified wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) transmission line. The study focuses on the investigation of increasing the input power for the supervisory signal and the effect on the co-propagating WDM data signals using different channel spacing. This investigation is useful for determining the power limitation of the supervisory signal if extra power is needed to improve the monitoring. The study also shows the effect of spacing on the quality of the supervisory signal itself because of interaction with adjacent data signals.

We scrutinize the concept of integrable nonlinear communication channels, resurrecting and extending the idea of eigenvalue communications in a novel context of nonsoliton coherent optical communications. Using the integrable nonlinear Schrödinger equation as a channel model, we introduce a new approach-the nonlinear inverse synthesis method-for digital signal processing based on encoding the information directly onto the nonlinear signal spectrum. The latter evolves trivially and linearly along the transmission line, thus, providing an effective eigenvalue division multiplexing with no nonlinear channel cross talk. The general approach is illustrated with a coherent optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing transmission format. We show how the strategy based upon the inverse scattering transform method can be geared for the creation of new efficient coding and modulation standards for the nonlinear channel.

In this letter, we experimentally study the statistical properties of a received QPSK modulated signal and compare various bit error rate (BER) estimation methods for coherent optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing transmission. We show that the statistical BER estimation method based on the probability density function of the received QPSK symbols offers the most accurate estimate of the system performance.

Coherent optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (CO-OFDM) is an attractive transmission technique to virtually eliminate intersymbol interference caused by chromatic dispersion and polarization-mode dispersion. Design, development, and operation of CO-OFDM systems require simple, efficient, and reliable methods of their performance evaluation. In this paper, we demonstrate an accurate bit error rate estimation method for QPSK CO-OFDM transmission based on the probability density function of the received QPSK symbols. By comparing with other known approaches, including data-aided and nondata-aided error vector magnitude, we show that the proposed method offers the most accurate estimate of the system performance for both single channel and wavelength division multiplexing QPSK CO-OFDM transmission systems.

Four-wave-mixing (FWM) due to the fiber nonlinearity is a major limiting factor in coherent optical OFDM transmission. We propose to apply power pre-emphasis, i.e. to allocate the transmitted power non-uniformly among subcarriers in order to suppress the FWM impairment. The proposed technique was numerically investigated for both single channel 15.6 Gbs CO-OFDM transmissions and 7-channel WDM transmissions, showing that up to 1 dB improvement in the system's Q-factor can be achieved without considering sophisticated power loading algorithms developed for wireless communications.

Mode-locked lasers emitting a train of femtosecond pulses called dissipative solitons are an enabling technology for metrology, high-resolution spectroscopy, fibre optic communications, nano-optics and many other fields of science and applications. Recently, the vector nature of dissipative solitons has been exploited to demonstrate mode locked lasing with both locked and rapidly evolving states of polarisation. Here, for an erbium-doped fibre laser mode locked with carbon nanotubes, we demonstrate the first experimental and theoretical evidence of a new class of slowly evolving vector solitons characterized by a double-scroll chaotic polarisation attractor substantially different from Lorenz, Rössler and Ikeda strange attractors. The underlying physics comprises a long time scale coherent coupling of two polarisation modes. The observed phenomena, apart from the fundamental interest, provide a base for advances in secure communications, trapping and manipulation of atoms and nanoparticles, control of magnetisation in data storage devices and many other areas.

We demonstrate an accurate BER estimation method for QPSK CO-OFDM transmission based on the probability density function of the received QPSK symbols. Using a 112Gbs QPSK CO-OFDM transmission as an example, we show that this method offers the most accurate estimate of the system's performance in comparison with other known approaches.

With rapid increase of smartphone shipments and increasing popularity of wireless multimedia applications cellular networks are driven to capacity limits. How to effectively increase network capacity and improve user quality of experiences (QoE) are the subjects of a large body of research. Heterogeneous network structure, small cell deployment, massive MIMO and advance frequency resource management technologies are some example hot research topics for LTE cellular networks [1]. Due to the increasing network capacity presssue mobile service providers wish to achieve a frequency reuse of factor 1 in modern cellular networks. However frequency reuse across all the sectors of a cite and across cites will result in strong interference and low SINR for users located at sector boundaries and cell boundaries. A widely used approach to address the above problem is using fractional frequency reuse schemes, which improve the throughput of cell edge users at the cost of reduced frequency reuse. Recently an interesting alternative approach of improving frequency reuse schemes by horizontal sector offset is proposed for 3 sector multi-carrier UMTS in [3] and LTE networks in [4]. The main idea is that the two sectors which point to the same direction associated with the two carriers in UMTS networks or the two groups of subcarriers in LTE networks are now offset with the highest gain direction of one sector pointing to an original sector boundary. With this new approach the frequency reuse is not reduced compared to the traditional 3 sectors configuration. Large improvements on user throughput and handover performances have been reported in [3] and [4]. In the sector offset scheme the horizontal half-power beamwidth of sector antennas was set to 65° [3] [4]. Such setting is unnecessarily wide and may generate extra interference. In this paper we propose an approach to improve the existing sector offset scheme by setting a better horizontal half-power beamwidth, which can largely reduce network interference and user outrage probability, and improve network throughput. In parallel to the above work a statistic model is proposed to analyse the LTE network performance with and without sector offset, in terms of interference, spectrum efficiency and outrage probability. Numerical results show that with a properly configured half-power beamwidth network performances could be largely improved. The analytical model is also verified by simulations, which can be used as an effective tool for estimation of user QoE and network planning.

The recent explosive growth of voice over IP (VoIP) solutions calls for accurate modelling of VoIP traffic. This study presents measurements of ON and OFF periods of VoIP activity from a significantly large database of VoIP call recordings consisting of native speakers speaking in some of the world's most widely spoken languages. The impact of the languages and the varying dynamics of caller interaction on the ON and OFF period statistics are assessed. It is observed that speaker interactions dominate over language dependence which makes monologue-based data unreliable for traffic modelling. The authors derive a semi-Markov model which accurately reproduces the statistics of composite dialogue measurements.

The noise properties of supercontinuum generation continue to be a subject of wide interest within both pure and applied physics. Aside from immediate applications in supercontinuum source development, detailed studies of supercontinuum noise mechanisms have attracted interdisciplinary attention because of links with extreme instabilities in other physical systems, especially the infamous and destructive oceanic rogue waves. But the instabilities inherent in supercontinuum generation can also be interpreted in terms of natural links with the general field of random processes, and this raises new possibilities for applications in areas such as random number generation. In this contribution we will describe recent work where we interpret supercontinuum intensity and phase fluctuations in this way.