Minimization of dispersion and non-linear effects in WDM based long-haul high capacity optical communication systems

Abstract Chromatic dispersion and nonlinear impairments pose challenges in high-capacity optical transmission systems, leading to signal distortions, channel interference and diminished the transmission performances. This paper explores the utilization of dispersion compensating fibers (DCF) using different schemes to mitigate the dispersion that accumulates along the length of a fiber in a 16 × 10 Gbps high-capacity long haul WDM system over a range of 500 km. When different wavelengths of light pulses are transmitted through an optical fiber, they experience varying speeds due to the refractive index’s wavelength dependency. As a result, the light pulses become temporally spread out as they travel through the fiber, and this dispersion persists throughout the fiber’s length. Considering non-linear effects such as self-phase modulation (SPM) and cross-phase modulation (XPM), this paper analyze and compare the three compensation schemes of DCF in a 16 channel WDM system. Moreover the impact of non-linearities based on fiber length are also analyzed and compared. The results are evaluated by comparing metrics such as Q -factor, bit error rate (BER) and eye height. The analysis concludes that the symmetrical compensation scheme of DCF outperforms the pre- and post-compensation scheme. This finding suggests that the symmetrical compensation method offers a promising solution for high-capacity access networks, providing high spectral efficiency, cost-effectiveness, and improved flexibility.