CHROMATIC DISPERSION IN FIBEROPTIC MICROWAVE AND MILLIMETER-WAVE LINKS

The influence of chromatic fiber-dispersion on the transmission distan ce of fiber-optic microwave and millimeterwave links is analyzed and d iscussed in this paper, it is shown that dispersion significantly limi ts the transmission distance in intensity modulated direct detection l inks operating in the above 20 GHz frequency region by inducing a carr ier to noise penalty on the transmitted signal, At 60 GHz, a 1 dB pena lty is induced after less than 500 m transmission over standard single -mode fiber with a dispersion of 17 ps/km . nm and the signal is compl etely extinct after 1 km, In remote heterodyne detection links, the di spersion induces both a carrier to noise penalty and a phase noise inc rease on the transmitted signal, It is shown, however, that the induce d carrier to noise penalty is insignificant, At 60 GHz, the induced pe nalty is less than 0.3 dB after 100 km transmission. The phase noise i ncrease proves more dominant. At 60 GHz, a 150 Mbit/s QPSK signal is l imited to around 10 km of transmission.