An apparatus comprising a frontend configured to convert an optical IM signal associated with a remote optical transmitter into a plurality of analog electrical signals, determine a plurality of DC offsets for the analog electrical signals, remove the DC offsets from the analog electrical signals to produce a plurality of DC-free analog signals, and convert the DC-free analog signals into a plurality of DC-free digital signals, and a DSP unit coupled to the frontend and configured to perform fiber dispersion compensation on the DC-free digital signals according to a dispersion value associated with the remote optical transmitter to produce a plurality of DC-free compensated digital signals, and add the DC offsets to the compensated digital signals to produce a plurality of DC-restored compensated digital signals.

A method decodes an optical signal transmitted over an optical channel from a transmitter to a receiver. The receiver receives the transmitted optical signal to produce a digital signal which is filtered in the frequency domain for compensating static effects and/or dynamic effects. The filtering is performed in the frequency domain, while the frequency coefficients of the filter are updated in the time domain by updating at least some of time coefficients of the filter and transforming the time coefficients into the frequency domain.

A method and structure for equalization in coherent optical receivers. Block-based LMS (BLMS) algorithm is one of the many efficient adaptive equalization algorithms used to (i) increase convergence speed and (ii) reduce implementation complexity. Since the computation of the equalizer output and the gradient of the error are obtained using a linear convolution, BLMS can be efficiently implemented in the frequency domain with the constrained frequency-domain BLMS (FBLMS) adaptive algorithm. The present invention introduces a novel reduced complexity constrained FBLMS algorithm. This new approach replaces the two discrete Fourier transform (DFT) stages required to evaluate the DFT of the gradient error, by a simple frequency domain filtering. Implementation complexity can be drastically reduced in comparison to the standard constrained FBLMS. Furthermore, the new approach achieves better performance than that obtained with the unconstrained FBLMS in ultra-high speed coherent optical receivers.

Joint estimation of the framer index and the frequency offset in an optical communication system are described among various other features. A transmitter can transmit data frames using pilot and framer symbols. A receiver can estimate the framer index and frequency offset using the pilot and framer symbols, and identify the beginning of a header portion of a data frame. By identifying the beginning of the header portion of a data frame, the receiver can synchronize, with less error, the data transmitted by the transmitter and the data it received. To further improve the framer index estimation, a lock indicator signal can be generated to signal to other receiver components that the estimated framer indices are reliable. The receiver can determine frequency offset and additional framer index estimations with increased reliability when performed after the lock indicator signal is generated.

A spatial multiplexing optical receiver includes a plurality of coherent receivers configured to coherently receive each of spatially multiplexed and transmitted signals of a plurality of modes by using continuous wave light independent for each mode as local oscillator light, a plurality of frequency offset compensators configured to perform frequency offset compensation based on a correlation between a known training signal and a signal of each mode independently for each mode, for each of the coherently received signals of the plurality of modes, and a MIMO signal processing unit configured to perform MIMO signal processing on the signals of the plurality of modes subjected to the frequency offset compensation in the frequency offset compensator.

A link extender configured to extend a range of an optical transceiver module is provided. The link extender includes an array of semiconductor optical amplifiers (SOAs) configured to amplify an optical signal received from the optical transceiver module, a first plurality of variable optical attenuators (VOAs) configured to control a power output of the amplified optical signal output from the array of SOAs, and a plurality of dispersion compensation and filtering (DC&F) devices configured to compensate for chromatic dispersion of the optical signal.

A method and structure for a coherent optical receiver device. Timing recovery (TR) is implemented after channel dispersion (i.e., chromatic dispersion (CD) and polarization mode dispersion (PMD)) compensation blocks. This architecture provides both improves performance and reduces power consumption of the device. Also, a TR loop is provided, enabling computing, by an error evaluation module, a first sampling phase error (SPE) and computing, by a timing phase information (TPI) module coupled to the error evaluation module, a second SPE from a plurality of CD equalizer taps PMD equalizer taps. The first and second SPE are combined into a total phase error (TPE) in a combining module, and the resulting TPE is filtered by a timing recovery (TR) filter coupled to an interpolated timing recovery (ITR) module and the combining module. The ITR module then synchronizes an input signal of the coherent optical receiver according to the TPE.

Communication of light signals and optical cables can be managed to mitigate error associated with using optical cables to communicate light signals. A communication management component (CMC) can embed respective timing synchronization pulses in respective lights signals having respective wavelengths. The light signals can be typical light signals or can be squeezed and twisted to generate a desired twisted light signal. The light signals can be transmitted via the optical cable to a receiver. A CMC, at the receiver end, can determine error associated with the transmission of the light signals via the optical cable and respective characteristics of the respective light signals, including respective arrival times of the respective timing synchronization pulses and respective light intensity or power levels of the respective light signals. From the respective characteristics, CMC can determine a compensation action to perform mitigate the error with regard to subsequent transmissions of light signals.

A receiver for data recovery from a channel signal of a communications channel. The receiver includes a quantization circuit to generate a quantized code corresponding to the channel signal. A first decision circuit recovers, in a first signal processing mode, digital data for the channel signal based on the quantized representation of the channel signal. A second decision circuit recovers, in a second signal processing mode, the digital data for the channel signal based on the quantized representation of the channel signal. A controller selects between the first signal processing mode and the second signal processing mode based on a parameter indicative of a signal quality of the channel signal.

A polarization dependent loss (PDL) compensation device for an optical system can be configured to output a compensating PDL to at least partially cancel a PDL of the optical system. In certain embodiments, the device can include a first polarization controller configured to modify a state of polarization of an optical signal, a PDL emulator disposed upstream of the first polarization controller and configured to output the compensating PDL upstream of the first polarization controller, and a second polarization controller disposed upstream of the PDL emulator and configured to modify a state of polarization of the optical signal upstream of the PDL emulator.