Easier plastic fibre termination to speed up installation
An Ethernet transceiver from Firecomms of Cork, Ireland, now comes in a housing that allows instant termination of bare plastic optical fibre (POF). The company says the new POF port, OptoLock, on the transceiver will speed up and simplify the installation of devices in communications networks, such as Internet-protocol-television gateways, set-top boxes and hubs. “With this device, all the advantages of optical fibre can be brought into the home with do-it-yourself simplicity and costs,” CEO Declan O'Mahoney said. OptoLock is part of the company's EDL300 650-nm, 100 Mbit s−1 transceiver and is suitable for 1.5-mm or 2-mm diameter POF. The transceiver is compatible with IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) 802.3u fast-Ethernet standards, and has a logic interface compatible with both low-voltage differential signalling and current-mode logic.
Auto-aligning laser chip cuts costs
Avanex Corporation has released a 1,310-nm wavelength Fabry–Pérot laser chip that it claims will lower the cost of fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) applications. The PowerBeam 1931FL includes a spot-size converter along with special features for automated fibre alignment, all integrated into a single chip. When assembling laser transmitters these features remove the need for active alignment of an optical fibre to the chip, thus cutting the cost of production. The chip is designed for use in transmitters used in low-power, uncooled applications operating up to data speeds of 2.5 Gbit s−1, such as the diplexers and triplexers used in optical-networking terminals for FTTH deployments, which are extremely cost-sensitive.
Avanex has also released a Z-cut (where the crystal is cut perpendicular to the z axis) version of its 12.5 Gbit s−1 lithium niobate external modulators. The F10-Z is a pre-chirped, single-drive external modulator in the company's standard package for 4-inch, 300-pin multi-source agreement transponders. Yves Le Maitre, chief marketing officer for Avanex, says the availability of tunable lasers in reconfigurable networks has increased the demand for external modulators.
Diode laser gives uncooled answer
A high-power uncooled diode laser for powering cladding-pumped amplifiers used in FTTH and video-distribution applications, has been released by the US firm Alfalight. The AM6-940A-20-408 is a multimode 940-nm diode with a 4-W output. It has been qualified to the Telecordia GR-468 standard and comes in an uncooled, fully hermetic, epoxy-free, electrically isolated, 6-pin package. It has a 105-μm fibre output with a numerical aperture of 0.22, and operates over a wide temperature range of −5 °C to 70 °C with an internal thermistor for monitoring temperature. Typical performance figures include a threshold current of 0.4 A, drive voltage of 1.8 V and a spectral width of 4 nm. The spectral shift with submount temperature is 0.35 nm per degree Celsius.
Switch eases fibre management
The latest intelligent optical switches from Glimmerglass allow fibre-to-fibre connections to be created, monitored and protected both remotely and automatically. A 3.5-inch switch houses up to 190 fibres, and a 7-inch version holds as many as 380 fibres. Glimmerglass claims that both versions deliver fully non-blocking transparent connectivity in the industry's smallest form factor. When used with the latest version (release 4.0) the company's switch management console software allows centralized and remote management of the fibre infrastructure. According to Glimmerglass, this means that network administrators can monitor traffic and optical performance throughout their network, detect and isolate failed connections and configure automatic fail-over paths to route around breakages, without the need to visit the equipment and physically switch connections. The management software also provides additional options for redundancy and alarm management. CEO Robert Lundy says the new switches provide a dramatic improvement in efficiency.
First high-speed test and measurement equipment
Innocor says that its TestPoint test and measurement equipment is now able to analyse the performance of 40-Gbit s−1 optical-communication protocols — thanks to the introduction of a high-speed test module. The Canadian firm says that the result is the first test interface for emerging applications that operate at data rates of 40 Gbit s−1 (OC-768/STM-256 and OTU3). The module, along with a 43-Gbit s−1 version, works with the company's TestPoint product line to allow testing of a variety of protocols in research and development for next-generation broadband networks. The 40-Gbit s−1 module is available in both the 3-slot TS-30 chassis configuration, for benchtop and mobile applications and the 17-slot TS-170 configuration for manufacturing needs. The platform, which uses field-programmable gate arrays and a flexible hardware architecture, allows testing of different configurations of interface types, transmission rates and protocols.
Software interface unifies ray tracing and optoelectronic design
Two US software companies specializing in different aspects of optical design have joined forces to create an interface that bridges the gap between ray tracing and optoelectronic design. RSoft Design Group and Optical Research Associates have worked together to develop an interface that allows RSoft's Component Design Suite and ORA's CodeV software to work together in the design and modelling of optical devices. The combination provides optical simulation of photonic devices used in telecommunications as well as other applications. The software allows modelling of both optoelectronic design and ray tracing. Systems can be tested from the component to the network level. “Having optical design companies cooperate to develop convenient and easy-to-use solutions will accelerate the design process and speed time-to-market for the end user,” said RSoft CEO, Robert Scarmozzino.
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Transceivers, lasers and optical switches. Nature Photon 1, 161 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2007.20
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2007.20
