A new technique for all-optical code division multiple access (CDMA) b
ased on optical holography is described, In this technique the energy
of an incoming information light signal is spread over a larger spatia
l domain by a two-dimensional spatial encoder which consists of patter
ns of (0, 1) or (1, -1), Subsequent decoding, which is obtained by a h
olographic filter, spatially despreads the energy of information light
signal and brings it to a bright focused light spot, Experimental res
ults obtained to demonstrate encoding, decoding, and multiaccess capab
ility of the proposed Holographic CDMA technique will be discussed and
compared to other all-optical CDMA techniques, The processing gain fo
r a holographic CDMA can be potentially as high as 10(6)-10(8), which
suggests that this technique can in principle support hundreds of thou
sands to a few millions of users.