Cisco Technology, Inc.

Pirelli Cavi E Sistemi S.p.a.

Pirelli & C. S. P. A.

Federico Carniel

Marco Mazzini

Andrea Ivano Melloni

Raffaella Costa

Fabrizio Di Pasquale

Eliana Silvia Vercelli

Ada Livia Braverman

Waveguide bends are specially designed according to a matching condition in order to suppress mode distortion and other undesirable effects. The bend is structured having regard to its length and curvature to ensure that at its end the first and second bend modes are substantially in phase with each other having completed approximately an integer number of beats. By being in phase at the end of the bend, the two modes are able to properly reconstruct the first mode of the straight waveguide and propagate on with a minimum of distortion, whether it be into a straight section, a further curved section of arbitrary curvature, into a free space propagation region and the like. This approach suppresses mode distortion, transition losses and other negative effects of waveguide bends. Device applications include couplers, Y-branches and Mach-Zehnder interferometers, all of which include waveguide bends.

Waveguide bends and devices including waveguide bends

End of line dispersion compensation is applied on a sub-band by sub-band basis. Adequate end-of-line dispersion compensation may be provided for high data rate WDM systems even for optical link lengths of 1000 km or more. Dispersion compensating gratings (DCGs) may be used as the dispersion compensating components. There is a great savings in cost and package volume compared to per-channel compensation schemes.

Chromatic dispersion compensation by sub-band

A hybrid waveguide structure having a combination of buried waveguide sections and ridge waveguide sections on the same substrate, share a common core layer. The buried waveguide sections provide the low index contrast desirable for couplers and other device components. The ridge waveguide sections provide the high index contrast needed for efficient low-loss tightly curved waveguides. The devices are fabricated starting from a low index contrast buried waveguide. Cladding material is then selectively removed by etching down from an upper surface either side of the waveguide core to a lower surface. This forms an enhanced index contrast ridge section of the waveguide. The other sections of the waveguide core remain buried and thus retain lower index contrast. Using this approach, a variety of optical devices, such as add/drop or add-after-drop multiplexers for WDM applications based on microrings or Mach-Zehnder interferometers, can be made with large feature sizes of several microns using silica-on-glass or silica-on-silicon technology, for example, and without having to use nanofabricated semiconductor structures.

Hybrid buried/ridge planar waveguides

Raman amplification of a WDM signal with excellent gain flatness across a very large bandwidth is achieved. Co-propagating and counter-propagating Raman pumping are combined in the same fiber. Multiple pumping wavelengths are employed. Wavelengths employed for co-propagating pumping and wavelengths employed for counter-propagating pumping alternate in order of wavelength. In one embodiment, N co-propagating pump wavelengths and N+1 counter-propagating pump wavelengths are used. Alternatively, one may use N+1 co-propagating pump wavelengths and N counter-propagating pump wavelengths.

Gain flattened bi-directionally pumped Raman amplifier for WDM transmission systems

Optical amplification bandwidth is improved by providing an economical and practical way of multiplexing together multiple Raman pump energy sources at disparate wavelengths. An arrayed waveguide grating (AWG) may be used to implement a double multiplexer. The insertion loss of the AWG is very low, allowing a reduction in the necessary power. Also, a single AWG may be used to combine numerous pump wavelengths.

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Milan, Italy

Federico Carniel