The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Dec. 24, 2002
Filed:
Dec. 05, 2000
Onetta, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Abstract
Optical amplifiers are provided for use in fiber-optic communications networks. Gain may be provided using one or more rare-earth-doped fiber coils such as erbium-doped fiber coils. The coils may be pumped by laser diodes or other suitable pumps. The optical output power of the pumps in a given amplifier may be controlled by a control unit. Taps may be used to monitor the power of optical signals being amplified by the amplifier. The tapped optical signals may be spectrally-filtered. The control unit may calculate the appropriate pump power for the pumps to supply to the fiber coils based on the measured spectrally-filtered optical signals. The gain of the amplifier may be maintained at a desired level using feedback control techniques. The gain spectrum of the amplifier need not be flat. A combination of feed-forward and feedback techniques may be used to calculate the pump power to be supplied by the pumps.